This startup plans to recycle aluminum from cars and keep it all in the U.S. [Video]

The drive to recycle just about everything is gaining ground, but the process — separating out all the different materials and item types — can be both confusing and tedious for consumers. For industrial recycling, it can be even more cumbersome.

Scrap metal, in particular, needs to be sorted in order to reduce pieces to their pure type. Traditionally the majority of scrap is shipped overseas and hand-sorted or melted down into lower-quality materials with limited uses. If it can be sorted in a better way, its value can be maintained, reducing both energy and emissions at the same time.

That’s where Sortera, a startup based in Indiana, hopes to come in. It’s one of several companies aiming to revamp the entire process.

In Markle, Indiana, for instance, Sortera is helping sort thousands of tons of shredded aluminum into different alloys, or types and grades of the metal.

“Things that …