European Aluminium welcomes the European Commission’s new plans to secure a long-term decarbonised economy by 2050.

“Irrespective of the scenarios you can choose, there will be the need to embrace strong sustainability programmes and redefine business models. Our industry is working for many years to put efficiencies, incremental and breakthrough innovation in action. There is no choice but to enhance the potential of our strategic material and its unique low carbon applications by decarbonising all our processes from primary production to recycling,” said Gerd Götz, European Aluminium’s Director General.

European Aluminium is working intensively on a new Vision 2050 to be unveiled before the end of the year. This document will contain fundamental data points to understand the contribution of the entire industry in the ongoing decarbonisation process.

“Thanks to aluminium’s inherent properties such as its light weight and endless recyclability, many end-use sectors are already using our metal to achieve carbon reduction and enhance circular economy models. Our preliminary data shows that aluminium demand will continue to grow in Europe and worldwide and that our direct and indirect CO2 emissions will be reduced steadily overtime. The European aluminium industry will decarbonise as the power production decarbonises but this is not sufficient to achieve the 2050 ambitions. There is a clear need to combine the right regulatory framework for industry, technology innovations, and market drivers to reach our full potential,” concluded Götz.