Across the Aluminum Value Chain: How Collaboration Drives Decarbonization

Thought leadership by Renato Bacchi, Alcoa’s Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer

The aluminum industry plays a pivotal role in enabling the global energy transition. From lightweight vehicles and renewable energy systems to sustainable packaging, aluminum is essential to achieving net zero.

Yet it is also among the most energy-intensive materials to produce. The challenge — and opportunity — is to provide low-carbon aluminum to further enable the green transition.

At Alcoa, we recognize that this transformation cannot be achieved by any single company or technology. It requires collaboration across the entire aluminum value chain — from producers of low-carbon metal to fabricators, manufacturers and global brands — working together to decarbonize production, improve recycling, and further sustainable supply at scale.

 From Innovation to Market Impact
A recent example of this is the collaboration between Alcoa, Ball and Unilever, who have piloted the first consumer personal care and home care packaging made with aluminum produced using ELYSIS^® carbon-free smelting technology.

The ELYSIS joint venture, co-owned by Alcoa and Rio Tinto, is working on smelting technology that will replace the carbon anode in smelting with an inert material that emits oxygen instead of CO₂, eliminating all direct greenhouse gas emissions. The metal used in this project has an approximately 40% lower carbon footprint than conventional low-carbon primary aluminum. When combined with 50% post-consumer recycled content, the result is a lower-carbon packaging solution that connects breakthrough innovation with everyday consumer products.

Each part plays a critical role — Alcoa delivered aluminum made using the ELYSIS technology, Ball adapted the technology to its high-performance packaging systems, and Unilever will bring it into the hands of consumers through globally recognized brands. This collaboration demonstrates how commercial partnerships can translate technological progress into tangible climate impact.

Building on this momentum, ELYSIS also achieved a major new technology milestone. Just one week after the packaging announcement, ELYSIS successfully started up its 450 kiloampere (kA) designed inert anode cell at the end of an existing potline at the Rio Tinto smelter in Alma, Québec — a defining moment in the transition toward large-scale, low-carbon aluminum production. This marks a series of global firsts: the first implementation of inert anode technology at this commercial-size scale, the first at this amperage, and the first deployment of its kind in the world. More detail is available in the official announcement here.

Enabling Competitive Decarbonization
As discussed during New York Climate Week and in Alcoa’s white paper, “Competitiveness & Green Transition: Finding Synergies or Facing Trade-Offs,” the path to decarbonization must also be economically viable. Sustainable materials must remain competitive against higher-emission alternatives.

That means creating the right conditions for investment:

• Market transparency and traceability that reward verified low-carbon materials.
• Policies that align climate ambition with industrial competitiveness. 
• Collaborative supply agreements that help customers plan long term and share the cost of innovation. 

These are the commercial foundations of a lower-carbon aluminum value chain — and they depend on collaboration as much as technology.

The Business Case for Partnership 
Alcoa’s commercial strategy reflects this reality. Our customers are not only buying metal; they are investing in the integrity of their supply chain. They seek partners who can provide transparency, innovation and reliability.

By working together, we can de-risk the path to decarbonization for all stakeholders. Long-term partnerships create scale, unlock financing for new technology, and accelerate the adoption of sustainable products.

The collaboration with Ball and Unilever exemplifies this model in practice, translating technological innovation into commercial and climate impact. It shows that when upstream producers, downstream manufacturers and consumer brands align around shared goals, they can redefine what’s possible for aluminum — not decades from now, but today.

A Path Forward 
Looking ahead, the aluminum industry’s success will depend on continuing to close the gap between innovation and implementation. Breakthrough technologies like those being developed by ELYSIS must reach commercial maturity and global scale; recycling systems must be expanded to capture post-consumer metal; and customers must have confidence in both the environmental and economic performance of low-carbon aluminum.

That is the essence of collaboration across the value chain — aligning market forces, technological innovation and shared purpose to create progress that endures.

At Alcoa, we see collaboration not as a choice, but as a commercial necessity for a more sustainable, resilient aluminum industry.