The mere reduction of a car's weight -- by replacing steel with aluminum during the manufacturing process -- could lead to potential savings of up to 140 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) and the equivalent of 60 billion liters of crude oil over the lifespan of the entire vehicle fleet. That's quite impressive!But why stop there?Indeed, a recent study by the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research came to the conclusion that a worldwide reduction of the weight of all vehicles -- cars, trucks, railroad vehicles, planes, ships -- would save about 660 million tons of GHGs per year, which represents 9 percent of GHGs produced by the entire world transportation network. A few examples A bumper beam made of aluminum weighs 2.6 kilos less than a steel beam. The hood of an American family sedan is 42-percent lighter when aluminum is used instead of steel. Finally, each ton of iron used to manufacture cylinder blocks saves approximately 8,000 liters of crude oil over their lifecycle.
Transportation-related GHGs to drop significantly thanks to aluminum