Materials Data Series · No. 02

Aluminium: The Metal That Made Things Light

The world's #2 metal, a third the weight of steel, endlessly recyclable, and almost entirely made by burning electricity. Who makes it, what the alloys do, why it flies, and the energy story behind every can. 2024–25 (IAI / USGS) · Compiled June 2026

World primary 2024

72.3 Mt

▲ growth resumed into 2025

China share

59.4%

~43 Mt, near its ~45 Mt policy cap

Rank among metals

2nd only to steel by volume

Recycling energy saving

~95%

vs smelting from ore

Where the World's Aluminium Is Smelted (2024)

Colour intensity shows each country's share of global production. Hover a country for its figure.

Lower shareHigher share

2024 Primary Aluminium Production by Country (Mt)

Even more lopsided than steel: China makes ~59% of the world's primary aluminium, because primary aluminium is really "solid electricity," and China has the cheap coal power to make it.

World Production Trend (Mt)

Unlike steel, aluminium demand keeps climbing, lightweighting cars, EV bodies, solar frames and packaging all pull the curve up.

Where Aluminium Is Used (global demand)

Transport and construction take about half. Packaging, mostly drink cans, is the recycling poster child.

72 million tonnes a year, made tangible.

Annual world primary output (~72 Mt) divided by the aluminium in everyday things. Verify-and-cite figures in the footer.

2.3 t

every second

Smelters pour ~2.3 tonnes of fresh aluminium every second, all year.

5.6 tn

drink cans / year

At ~13 g each, a year of output could stamp out ~5.6 trillion cans.

1.0 mn

Boeing 747s / year

A jumbo jet holds ~70 tonnes of aluminium. We make a million's worth.

400 mn

cars' worth / year

At ~180 kg of aluminium per modern car, and rising every model year.

Aluminium vs Every Other Metal (annual world production, Mt)

Here's the humbling part: aluminium is the world's #2 metal, yet steel still out-produces it about 25 to 1. Nothing competes with steel on volume.

Pure Aluminium Is Weak. The Alloys Are Not.

Pure aluminium yields at ~30 MPa, softer than copper. The whole engineering story is in the alloy series: small additions of copper, magnesium, silicon and zinc multiply its strength by 10× or more.

1xxx, commercially pure. Soft, conductive, corrosion-proof. Foil, power lines.
2xxx (Al-Cu), high strength, aircraft skins. Less corrosion-resistant.
3xxx (Al-Mn), moderate strength, very formable. Cans, roofing.
5xxx (Al-Mg), marine-grade, weldable, salt-water tough.

6xxx (Al-Mg-Si), the all-rounder. Extrudable, weldable, strong enough. 6061 & 6063 are everywhere: window frames, bike frames, EV chassis.
7xxx (Al-Zn), the strongest. 7075 rivals structural steel in strength at a third of the weight, which is why it flies.

Alloy Library, Composition & Typical Properties

Typical published datasheet values (ASM / MatWeb), standard tempers. Watch yield strength climb across the series while density barely moves (~2.7 g/cc).

Alloy	Series	Key alloy	Yield (MPa)	Tensile (MPa)	Density	Typical use

Why It Flies: Strength per Unit Weight

Steel is stronger in absolute terms, but aluminium is a third as dense (2.7 vs 7.85 g/cc). Plot strength against density and the trick appears: 7075 aluminium delivers structural-steel strength at a fraction of the weight. That's the entire reason aircraft, EVs and bikes are aluminium.

Aluminium alloys Steel (for reference)

Specific Strength (yield ÷ density)

Normalise strength by weight and the best aluminium alloys sit right alongside common steels, while weighing far less.

Yield Strength Across the Series (MPa)

From soft 1100 foil (~117 MPa) to aerospace 7075 (~503 MPa), a 4× span from near-identical density.

Electricity per tonne

~15 MWh

≈ a UK home for 4 years

Primary CO₂ (world avg)

16.5 t

per tonne of aluminium

Recycled CO₂

~0.6 t

~95% lower than primary

Recyclable, forever

∞

no loss of properties on remelt

Primary vs Recycled, Energy per Tonne (GJ)

Recycling a tonne of aluminium needs ~8 GJ. Making it fresh from bauxite needs ~186 GJ. That ~95% gap is why the scrap aluminium in your bin is worth real money.

Primary CO₂ Depends Entirely on the Power Source

Aluminium has no single carbon number. Smelt it on coal and it's ~20 t CO₂/t; on hydro, ~4 t. Two-thirds of its footprint is just the electricity.

Why It Matters

Aluminium is a paradox: one of the most energy-intensive materials to make, yet one of the most climate-friendly to reuse. A primary tonne can carry 16.5 t of CO₂; the same metal recycled carries almost none, and aluminium loses nothing on remelting, so it can cycle indefinitely. The lever is the grid: because ~60% of primary aluminium is smelted in China on coal power, the metal's global footprint rises and falls with where the electricity comes from. Decarbonising aluminium is really two problems, cleaner smelter power and collecting more scrap, and the second one is the cheapest tonne of carbon savings in heavy industry.