Novelis VP for Global Automotive is bullish about aluminium's prospects in the automotive industry

Roland Harings, Vice President of Global Automotive for Novelis, is bullish about the prospects for aluminium in the automotive industry, telling Automotive World's Automotive Megatrends magazine that he expects "a significant step change in the use of aluminium in the body-in-white now for the next five to ten years." Aluminium will grow from being "a niche material with a share in the body-in-white of about 1%", he says, to "3%, 4% or 5%. Beyond 2017, you can even imagine that we will have a share of 10% to 15% of the body-in-white materials supplied to the automotive industry."

The company says it is expecting a growth in demand for aluminium in automotive applications of 25% CAGR (compound annual growth rate) over the next five years. Whilst this growth will be assisted by the anticipated growth in global annual new vehicle sales, Harings also expects the proportion of aluminium in vehicles to increase over the next decade. “We see a trend that aluminium is gaining. Most, if not all, of the growth in aluminium will be in flat-rolled products. The major growth will be in the body-in-white, which is our business. Today, steel dominates, but you could say steel is coming under pressure from aluminium; at the same time, we see the carbon fiber materials and composites going after the higher strength and crash relevant parts of the body-in-white where high strength steel currently plays a dominant role. Aluminium is far ahead of the plastics and the composites, but they will grow.”