Key takeaways
- A transition to recycled sources additionally pays off in emissions reductions.
- Recycled content material represented 24 p.c of the supplies (by mass) in merchandise shipped to clients in 2024.
- Boundaries to recycled content material embrace commerce treaties, restricted origin knowledge and scarce provide chain capability.
Apple’s push to supply 15 precedence supplies fully from recycled or renewable sources — together with aluminum, uncommon earths and lithium — is paying off in considerable emissions reductions for its manufacturing processes.
Apple has decreased its greenhouse fuel emissions by 60 p.c since 2015, on its solution to a 75 p.c lower by 2030, in accordance with the 2025 Apple Environmental Progress Report revealed April 16. (Emissions had been 15.1 million metric tons, down from 22.6 million within the baseline 12 months.) Throughout the interval in query, Apple’s income grew 65 p.c, to $391 billion.
A lot of Apple’s reported discount got here from renewable electrical energy investments, however sourcing recycled and different lower-carbon supplies helped the corporate keep away from 6.2 million metric tons of emissions in 2024. Averted emissions, generally referred to as Scope 4, are calculated by estimating the quantity of greenhouse gases that weren’t emitted due to manufacturing adjustments or different measures and subtracting them from historic emissions developments.
Apple claimed 41 million metric tons in averted emissions for 2024. Shifting to recycled supplies accounted for 15 p.c of that claimed discount. For context, product manufacturing actions characterize 54 p.c of Apple’s general carbon footprint.
Recycled content material from sources licensed to ISO 14021 specs accounted for twenty-four p.c of the supplies in Apple merchandise in 2024. The product containing essentially the most recycled supplies was the MacBook Air, at 55 p.c. A detailed second is the most recent Mac mini: 50 p.c of its parts come from recycled sources and it’s manufactured utilizing renewable power, making its footprint 80 p.c smaller than a mini created utilizing a business-as-usual situation, Apple stated.
The corporate is prioritizing 15 supplies in its recycled content material transition, representing 87 p.c of its manufacturing by mass: aluminum, cobalt, copper, glass, gold, lithium, paper, plastics, uncommon earth components, metal, tantalum, tin, titanium, tungsten and zinc.
“Our technique is to transition to supplies which might be manufactured utilizing low-carbon power and recycled content material,” the corporate stated in its environmental report. “We’ve prioritized the supplies and parts that make up a big a part of our product carbon footprint to maneuver us nearer to our aim of carbon neutrality.”
Highlight on aluminum
Working example: Apple used recycled sources for 71 p.c of the aluminum it purchased in 2024 — a method that would show prescient as producers reckon with Trump-era aluminum tariffs.
Recycled aluminum is used for the enclosures of just about each Apple product: the most recent Apple Watch collection and Mac mini fashions, MacBook Air and MacBook Professional, iPads and iPhones. Apple reclaims a portion of that aluminum from previous Apple merchandise that it takes again by means of trade-in packages and procures the remainder from different post-consumer and post-industrial sources.
That initiative has decreased aluminum-related emissions 76 p.c since 2015. The fabric represented 7 p.c of Apple’s product manufacturing footprint for 2024, in contrast with 27 p.c within the baseline 12 months.
Apple can also be investing in a Canadian enterprise, referred to as Elysis, commercializing a course of to smelt aluminum with out emitting direct greenhouse gases. The fabric isn’t but out there at industrial scale, nevertheless it’s been utilized in some iPhone SE fashions, circa 2022.
Work in progress
Apple has a number of different near-term objectives for recycled metals and uncommon earth components that it’s near assembly. They embrace:
- Recycled cobalt for all Apple-designed batteries: It’s at 99 p.c for the batteries; 78 p.c of the cobalt sourced for all merchandise in 2024 was recycled, in contrast with 52 p.c in 2023.
- Recycled sources for all tin soldering and gold plating in sure circuit boards: They represented 99 p.c in 2024.
- Recycled uncommon earth components for all magnets: They characterize 99 p.c of what’s utilized in Apple batteries and 80 p.c for all of Apple’s uncommon earth wants.
As well as, Apple’s progress on sourcing recycled gold — utilized in circuit boards, connectors and chips — accelerated from 2021 to 2024. In 2024, recycled gold was used for 40 p.c of fabric in all merchandise, up from 1 p.c in 2021. The corporate doubled the variety of suppliers licensed to fabricate these supplies over the previous 12 months.
Challenges to future will increase in recycled supplies utilization embrace overcoming technical issues corresponding to sturdiness and potential contamination; constrained provide availability; restricted knowledge that traces origins; and worldwide laws that will inhibit cross-border shipments. “Addressing these takes a collective response,” Apple stated.
[Join over 1,500 professionals transforming how we make, sell, and circulate products at Circularity, April 29-May 1, Denver.]
