The Story of Stuff - Annie Leonard [56]
Next, the aluminum oxide is transported to smelters, and this is where the truly gross aspects of aluminum production kick in. There’s a reason scientists call aluminum “congealed energy”: making one aluminum can takes energy equivalent to one-quarter of the can’s volume in gasoline.80 Aluminum smelting requires more energy than any other metal processing on earth.81
At the smelter, the aluminum oxide crystals are dissolved in a bath of something called cryolite (sodium aluminum fluoride) and zapped with enormous jolts of electricity (100,000 to 150,000 amps), which strips the oxygen from the aluminum. This process also breaks off bits of the fluorine from the cryolite, which escapes the smelter in the form of perfluorocarbons (PFCs)—these are the most noxious of greenhouse gases, trapping thousands of times more heat than carbon dioxide. What remains is pure aluminum, which gets poured into molds and cooled into bars. Then these bars are shipped elsewhere, rolled into super-thin sheets, and shipped to another factory that punches and forms those sheets into cans. They are washed, dried, primed, painted with the brand and product information, lacquered, sprayed inside with a noncorrosive coating, and finally filled with a beverage.82
After all that, the can’s contents are consumed in a matter of minutes, and the can is trashed in a matter of seconds. “I don’t understand my countrymen. They import this product, drink the garbage, and then throw away the valuable resource,” says Puerto Rican activist Juan Rosario, bemoaning the high levels of soda consumption and low level of recycling on his island.83
Globally, about a third of aluminum smelters use coal-generated electricity. In addition to carbon dioxide emissions, this pollutes our air with tons of carbon monoxide (the gas that’ll kill you if you leave your car running in a closed space), sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide.84
Most of the smelters in the United States and other developed countries have been shut down, and those that are still operational probably won’t be up and running much longer. Since 20 to 30 percent of aluminum’s total production cost is electricity, while the transportation costs from mines to refineries to smelters constitutes less than 1 percent,85 it’s common to ship the raw materials around the world to take advantage of the cheapest power. Rio Tinto, a huge Australian mining concern, has plans for a new smelter in Abu Dhabi.86 Why there? Because now that Australia’s coming on board with international carbon emissions policies (the Kyoto Protocol’s follow-up), that old coal-fired plant will become too expensive, while Abu Dhabi will remain a carbon free-for-all zone.
Worldwide, smelters in rich countries where energy is becoming more expensive are being abandoned in favor of building new ones (plus the power plants needed to fuel them, usually dam projects) in farther-flung places like Mozambique, Chile, Iceland, and along the Amazon River in Brazil.87 Construction of the dams, roads, and other necessary infrastructure (plus the waste and emissions once the plants are up and running) seriously threatens lives—human, animal, and vegetable—and the climate. For example, a planned site in Iceland would flood a pristine area that contains more than one hundred breathtaking waterfalls and habitat for reindeer and other vulnerable wildlife.88 Glenn Switkes, the Amazon Program Director of International Rivers, an organization dedicated to protecting rivers around the world, explains that aluminum companies are the principle force behind the Brazilian government