The European Commission has begun preparatory work on a new measure that will ensure Europe’s aluminium recycling industry has access to adequate volumes of aluminium scrap, trade and economic security commissioner Maros Sefcovic announced at the European Aluminium summit in Brussels that was held recently.

The European Commission officer says he considers restricting aluminium scrap exports to be fully in line with a circular economy logic.

In a mid-November speech to a European aluminium producers trade association, a trade official with the Brussels-based European Commission (EC) said he was “pleased to announce that we are launching the preparatory work on a new measure to address the issue of aluminium scrap leakage.”

In his address to members of European Aluminium, EC Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Maroš Šefčovič quickly added, “We do not want to completely block aluminium scrap exports.”

Continued Šefčovič, “We want to prepare a balanced measure that will allow industries using aluminium to access adequate quantities of this strategically important material at competitive prices, in order to pursue their path towards decarbonisation, fully in line with a circular economy logic.”

The government official said the measure he would like to see adopted by the spring of 2026 “will take into account the interests of all actors in the aluminium value chain, from producers, to recyclers, to downstream sectors, and will respect the international obligations of the European Union.”

Šefčovič also encouraged attendees of the trade group meeting to participate in a public consultation and a “call for evidence” the EC intends to launch by the end of this year.

Groups representing recycled metal processors and traders already have expressed their viewpoints as the notion of an export ban has been discussed throughout 2025.

In a September statement, the Berlin-based Association of German Metal Traders and Recyclers (VDM) and the Düsseldorf, Germany-based Federal Association of German Steel Recycling and Disposal Companies (BDSV) said such policies are “the wrong way to go – especially at a time when the sales situation in Germany is extremely tense for many companies in the recycling industry.”

On the same day as the speech by Šefčovič, Brussels-based European Aluminium said it “warmly welcomes” the announcement by the EC official.

“This is a strong and timely statement of intent from the Commission,” says Paul Voss, director general of European Aluminium. “Europe’s future will to a large extent depend on its ability to secure access to the raw materials that our economy and our society require. It is therefore hugely encouraging to see the EU acting so decisively to save our scrap.”

The metals producing association ties the measure to wider global trade policies being put in place this decade, including “the doubling of United States Section 232 tariffs on aluminium to 50 per cent.”

Delegates and speakers at the European Aluminium summit welcomed the commission’s announcement. Paul Warton, head of Hydro’s extrusions business and chair of European Aluminium, said he was “very pleased” by the announcement, while European Aluminium director-general Paul Voss called the current situation with aluminium scrap leaving Europe in greater quantities “the definition of a market failure”.

The EU and UK together exported around 1.6 million tons of aluminium scrap in 2024, almost a quarter higher than in 2022 and around 60 per cent up on 2019.