Event spotlight: Mining Innovation Summit

Organised by Mining Hub, Tolga Egrilmezer, Group Head of Sales & Marketing, Rio Tinto spoke at the first ever Mining Innovation Summit to share how START plays an important role in ensuring transparency in materials production and sourcing.

Watch his presentation. He speaks about START from 10:04 – 11:52.

Providing traceability and transparency across supply chains with key sustainability criteria

Transcript (10:04 - 11:52):

In addition to helping the world secure materials needed for the energy transition, as producers, we have a responsibility to enable the transparency and traceability of our supply chains so that others further down the value chain can have more visibility.

That is why we developed START.

START empowers our customers, end-users, and the consumer with data and facts regarding key metrics around our materials. The technology, built on blockchain, allows us to give real-time data to our customers’ operations and their leadership. This new standard for aluminium production—providing transparency, traceability, and technology—gives our partners the information they need to make more sustainable decisions.

A real-life example of this traceability is a partnership with ABInbev in 2022, with whom we launched a specially-marked, low-carbon Corona Canada beverage can—made from Rio Tinto aluminium, including ELYSIS.

In this pilot, the cans included a consumer QR code. Scanning the code took users to a web page to learn more about the cans’ low carbon footprint. This process will be used to provide customers with 14 key ESG metrics. This ground-breaking pilot is the next step towards putting a fully traceable beverage can in the hands of consumers.