National City Recycling Challenge Exceeds 100 Million Aluminum Cans

The United States Conference of Mayors and Novelis Announce Winners

WASHINGTON, Nov. 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The United States Conference of Mayors and Novelis Inc. (NYSE: NVL) (TSX: NVL) announced the winners in the Cans For Cash: City Recycling Challenge on America Recycles Day. For the second year, the program challenged like-sized cities to compete against each other in aluminum can collection for monetary awards and to encourage recycling. During the first two weeks in September, more than 40 cities collected over 3 million pounds of aluminum cans which equates to 107 million used beverage cans.

"We are pleased with the results of this year's campaign and want to thank communities for their enthusiasm and tremendous effort in encouraging their residents to recycle aluminum cans," said Kevin Greenawalt, President, Novelis North America. "Recycling is a fundamental element of Novelis' corporate sustainability commitment, and we are dedicated to fostering efforts to promote the value of recycling aluminum through programs like Cans for Cash in order to encourage and help cities sustain their local efforts."

The 2005 campaign saw a 73% increase in aluminum cans recycled -- an additional 45 million cans were collected and recycled over the 2004 campaign which collected a total of 62 million cans. Based on the national economic average for recycled aluminum cans, the 2005 Cans For Cash: City Recycling Challenge cans collected and processed have a dollar value at approximately US$2 million.

The winners of the $5,000 awards for the most aluminum cans recycled are:

Division One (population 250,000+) Milwaukee, WI* - Mayor Tom Barrett at 1,002,792 pounds
Division Two (population 100,00-249,999) Knoxville, TN*- Mayor Bill Haslam at 182,672 pounds
Division Three (population 50,000-99,999) Des Plaines, IL - Mayor Anthony Arredia at 356,380 pounds
Division Four (population below 50,000) Artesia, CA - Mayor Larry R. Nelson at 73,020 pounds

* Note: 2004 Winner in Division Category

To help mayors engage their communities in recycling and raise awareness about its importance over the long term, cities submitted innovative education and marketing ideas for an additional $5,000 award. The cities being recognized for the most innovative campaigns are as follows:

Division One: Louisville, KY - Mayor Jerry E. Abramson
Division Two: Salt Lake City, UT - Mayor Rocky Anderson
Division Three: Fargo, ND - Mayor Bruce Furness
Division Four: Monticello, IN - Mayor Bob Fox

"We are proud that our Cans For Cash Program helped jump-start existing programs and redirected many communities to focus on a common goal. Mayors leveraged their relationships with community and civic organizations, partnered with schools, and linked the can recycling challenge with community improvement and service projects," said The U.S. Conference of Mayors President and Long Beach (CA) Mayor Beverly O'Neill. "Participating cities should be excited and proud that they contributed to the recycling of more than 3 million pounds of aluminum cans."

The aluminum can is the country's most recycled beverage container and has been for more than 20 years. In 2004, more than 100 billion aluminum beverage cans were produced in the United States and 51% of them were recycled (a 1.2% increase over the previous year). Nearly the same amount -- close to 50 billion cans or roughly $1 billion worth of aluminum -- was lost to landfill.

For a complete list of cities that participated in the 2005 Cans for Cash program, please visit visit: http://www.usmayors.org.

The U.S. Conference of Mayors is the official nonpartisan organization of cities with populations of 30,000 or more. There are 1,139 such cities in the country today, each represented in the Conference by its chief elected official, the Mayor.

Novelis, which was spun off by Alcan effective January 6, 2005, is the global leader in aluminum rolled products and aluminum can recycling, with 36 operating facilities in 11 countries and more than 13,000 dedicated employees. Novelis has the unique ability to provide its customers with a regional supply of high-end rolled aluminum throughout Asia, Europe, North America, and South America. Through its advanced production capabilities, Novelis supplies aluminum sheet and foil to automotive, transportation, beverage and food packaging, construction, industrial and printing markets. Please visit http://www.novelis.com for more information.

    Note to Editor: Cans For Cash: City Recycling Challenge Historical Data

    Year           Pounds of Aluminum   No. of Cans per   No. of Aluminum Cans
                    Cans Collected     Pound of Aluminum       Collected
    2004               1,834,699                 34           62,379,767
    2005               3,147,828                 34          107,026,156
    Increase (yr/yr)
     2004/2005         1,313,129                              44,646,389

SOURCE Novelis
CONTACT: Susan Jarvis of USCM, +1-202-861-6760,
or sjarvis@usmayors.org;
or Pat Persico of Novelis, +1-440-423-6522,
or ppersico@novelis.com