World's biggest aluminum supplier says automotive-grade sales will triple

Novelis, based out of Atlanta, is the largest supplier of aluminum sheet to the auto industry, counting Ford, Audi and Jaguar among its clients. It's owned by Mumbai, India-based metals company Hindalco, the world's largest producer of aluminum sheet, and company reps see the aluminum market and their place in it expanding. In June, Novelis' VP of global recycling forecast carmaker demand for aluminum sheet to increase five-fold by 2020. The managing director at Hindalco said the company expected its own sales to rise three-fold, driven by the race to better fuel economy and lower emissions.

The demand for more will increase after that, according to another Novelis exec, with the weight of all aluminum content – such as sheet, plate, extrusions, foil – in global light vehicle production to approach 35 billion pounds by 2025. Today, aluminum weight for annual global vehicle production is only seven billion pounds according to market research firm Ducker Worldwide and the The Aluminum Association's Aluminum Transport Group, with "guaranteed" growth for the next 50 years. With demand already outstripping supply, you can expect an accelerated and guaranteed growth in the prices of new cars as well.