Few materials boast the special properties of aluminium, such as its high strength-to-weight ratio, corrosion resistance, electrical and thermal conductivity, and ease of sourcing. These properties have led to its ubiquitous use in every aspect of daily life, from kitchens to cars to houses and phones.
Aluminium sheets have basically built the modern world around us and will only grow in importance as the need for an easily recyclable, low-carbon footprint metal increases. Let's look at some of the diverse end-uses of aluminium in our modern world to see the impact of this wonder metal.
Aluminium sheets make up every aspect of modern life
Automotive manufacturing
One of the most common and important uses of aluminium sheets is in automobile manufacturing. The Audi R8 wowed the world with its full-aluminium body when it started production in 1994, and the use of aluminium in cars has only grown since. This is due to aluminium's high strength-to-weight ratio and malleability, which makes it ideal for the intricate designs and curves in contemporary car models.
Nowadays, almost all parts of a car's frame, from body panels and structural reinforcements to the chassis, can be made of or are made of aluminium sheeting. Compared to steel, aluminium allows for better fuel efficiency, engine performance, and crumple resistance while still being cheap to mould and use.
Aerospace engineering
Of course, aluminium's flagship use case is in the aerospace sector. Aluminium fits the exacting demands of the aerospace industry almost perfectly, whether it be its low weight, corrosion resistance, or strength. When it comes to maintaining structural integrity in harsh conditions while also providing good fuel efficiency and safety, aluminium sheets are the perfect solution.
Almost all aircraft in the air today have aluminium fuselages, wings, and airframes. This extends to spacecraft, too—NASA uses an amalgam of aluminium and lithium for its model rotors, among many other uses.
Packaging industry
Aluminium sheets are easy to mould into corrosion-resistant food-grade packaging - cans, foil, and containers are both light in weight and safe, unlike plastic. This, along with the ability to preserve the freshness of foods and extend their shelf life, has led the market for aluminium packaging to explode.
Since their introduction in 1957, the market for aluminium cans has been growing at a breakneck pace, projected to reach a massive $87.1 billion by 2030. Sustainability is a key driver of this growth as more and more food and beverage companies switch to aluminium from plastic. This is because aluminium sheets are 100% recyclable and very fuel efficient, meaning that both the cost and carbon footprint of recycled aluminium are quite low - a win-win solution.
Construction sector
Construction is another sector where aluminium sheeting plays a more significant role. Its high strength-weight ratio and corrosion resistance have led to its mass adoption in making housing doors, windows, frames, rebar, and other structural components. Its high malleability lowers the cost of construction, leading to cheaper housing, a sore need in today's economic climate.
Construction is another sector where aluminium sheeting plays a more significant role. Its high strength-weight ratio and corrosion resistance have led to its mass adoption in making housing doors, windows, frames, rebar, and other structural components. Its high malleability lowers the cost of construction, leading to cheaper housing, a sore need in today's economic climate.
Even exterior elements of buildings, such as cladding, facades, siding, roofing, and gutters, often use aluminium. Aluminium's recyclability has also helped to create more sustainable housing with a lower carbon footprint. This has rapidly made aluminium the second most used metal in construction, after steel.
Consumer electronics and cookware
The consumer electronics boom of the past ten years would have struggled to take off without mass aluminium usage. Electronics require a very specific set of properties, such as light weight, strength, conductivity, and corrosion resistance, to protect the delicate circuitry while still being light enough to hold in one hand.
The use of aluminium for chassis, fans, and phone cladding thus proved to be a game changer that took laptops, smartphones, PCs and powerful graphics cards from the labs to our hands. Many consumers prefer the aesthetics of a brushed aluminium chassis as well.
These same properties of aluminium have also proven useful in other domestic applications, such as household appliances and cookware, where thermal conductivity, corrosion resistance, and light weight are important. These days, it is quite common for TVs, dryers, refrigerators, washing machines, and more mundane cookware like utensils, cutlery, and pans to be made of aluminium alloy.
Marine applications
The sea is another place where harsh conditions and safety concerns require strength, lightness, and corrosion resistance - and as we already know, aluminium fits the bill. With salt corrosion, powerful winds, buoyancy, and fuel efficiency all important considerations in shipbuilding, aluminium sheets and plates offer the best mix of properties and cost, which makes them the preferred choice for building all but the largest and heaviest of supertankers. Most yachts, speedboats, light vessels, and skiffs today use aluminium as a major structural component.
Not just the present, aluminium will also build the future
As we can see, aluminium has built and permeated almost every aspect of our modern lives, and our society would be much less sustainable, efficient, and connected without this amazing metal. However, this trend will not stop any time soon, and aluminium will also build the future world where even more fuel efficiency from cars and planes, higher performing electronics, low environmental impact tools and utensils, and ever more housing for our urban populations will be needed. In fact, certain emerging sectors, such as robots, wearable electronics, drones, commercial spaceflight, and medical tech, will only increase the usage and cement the place of aluminium in industrial importance.
The aluminium industry is determined not to be left behind and is rapidly making innovations all along the value chain, from automated mining to better processing methods to new forging methods like incremental sheet forming (ISF) to improve the efficiency, price, and utility of aluminium products. In the same way that the 20th century was defined by steel, the 21st will be defined by aluminium.
