Amount of Steel Waste Recycled Hits New High in 2008

Friday, December 18th, 2009 at 3:48 pm

Of all the materials recycled in America, steel tops the list. Steel recycling is also one of the older processes because of the ease of doing so and the high cost in actually making steel from scratch.

All new steel in the U.S. contains at least 28% recycled content, with some varieties containing 90%.

Tin cans are actually steel. Cars, even lightweight ones, are built on steel. Appliances are made from steel. Steel girders hold up commercial buildings and form the backbone of bridges. And in 2008 in North America 83% of the steel in these products was recycled instead of discarded.

This data was just released by the Steel Recycling Institute which also maintains a website on the different aspects of Sustainable Steel.