Aluminium recycling firm Novelis has opened a new can recycling and casting centre at its Yeongju plant in South Korea.
The facility, which is Asia’s largest beverage can recycling plant, is part of a $400 million expansion of Novelis' operations in the country.
Phil Martens, Novelis’ president and chief executive said that the centre will boost the company’s sustainability credentials: "Combined with our other recycling operations worldwide, this new state-of-the-art facility makes Novelis the world's leading recycler of aluminium, saving valuable natural resources while enabling our customers to create world-class products with a much smaller environmental footprint."
Novelis has committed to increasing the recycled content of its rolled aluminium products to 80% by 2020. The company said that the South Korea centre is the first major step in the company's plan to increase its recycling capacity to 2.1 million tons by 2015.
The new facility will have an annual capacity of 265,000 tonnes, and will increase the company's total consumption of recycled aluminium to over 1.4 million tons per year. Other recycling expansions are already underway in Brazil and Germany, along with additional investments worldwide.
When running at full capacity, the new operation will add nearly 80 new positions to Novelis' 1200 employee workforce in Korea.
