Jaguar Land Rover, Britain’s largest automotive manufacturer, is using up to 50% recycled aluminium in new cars in a project that has brought significant benefits to the company and its suppliers.
The REALCAR (Recycled Aluminium CAR) project, supported by Innovate UK and the Office for Zero Emission Vehicles, demonstrated how the circular economy can bring major environmental benefits to manufacturing. In a circular economy, materials are continually reused and recycled rather than going to waste.
Video credit: Innovate UK.
On-screen captions and an autogenerated transcript are available on YouTube.
About the project
Jaguar Land Rover has invested in new and upgraded scrap segregation systems at three of its press shops.
The systems separate grades of aluminium scrap and deliver it to its supply chain partners. They then melt it down and reconstitute it as part of a new ‘recycling-friendly’ aluminium alloy developed by Novelis under the REALCAR project.
Novelis is the world’s largest recycler of aluminium. It also invested £6 million in new equipment to enable closed-loop manufacturing for the growing automotive aluminium sheet market, helping to create 30 full-time jobs.
Impacts of the project
The recycled aluminium is being used in the Jaguar XE, XF and F-PACE. The REALCAR2 project is looking at increasing the percentage of recycled material further.
Use of the recycled alloy is not only improving sustainability, but also helping Jaguar Land Rover to reduce its costs.
Adrian Tautscher, Jaguar Land Rover group leader sustainable aluminium technologies, said: “Both the REALCAR and the REALCAR2 projects have identified the huge opportunity that exists around the circular economy and resource efficiency.”
Find out more
Partners involved in the consortium were Novelis, Zyomax, Norton Aluminium, Stadco, Brunel University and Innoval Technology.
Read how Jaguar Land Rover aims to cut carbon emissions by a quarter through aluminium recycling.
Find out more about Innovate UK’s transport vision for the future.
Visit the Office for Zero Emission Vehicles website.
Top image: The REALCAR project increases recycled aluminium in cars. Credit: Jaguar Land Rover.