Over the past three decades, China has undergone a strong economic growth, largely industry-driven. The rise of consumption resulted in increasing material requirements like steel, cement, plastic and aluminium. Regarding aluminium, the in-use stock increased to 58.9 kg/capita in 2009, from around 8.5 kg/capita in 1989 and 19.4 kg/capita in 1999. China’s role in the aluminium industry is crucial. On its own, it produces around half of the world’s primary aluminium output, destined for both domestic consumption and international export markets. However China’s domestic bauxite reserves are limited and at current static exploitation would last for only 18 more years. Considering the low quality of its bauxite and the young and relatively low in-use stock level, China has to rely mainly on primary production, by heavily depleting its bauxite resources and by importing foreign bauxite and alumina. Primary aluminium production takes however a high environmental toll. This paper evaluates the effect of changes in: energy efficiency due to the technological level of both electricity and aluminium production, quality of resources and share of secondary and primary production; on the environmental impact due to the Chinese primary aluminium sector, by means of forecasting scenarios and mitigation potentials.
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