A 13-year-old boy has raised thousands of dollars for charity by recycling more than a million aluminum cans.
Young Ryan Hulance came up with the idea as a way to make money for foodbanks while also caring for the environment.
From his home in Solihull in England’s West Midlands, he started contacting businesses asking if they could spare any cans which he could sell.
Ryan started collecting a few hundred cans per week in 2023 to store at his home, which is when his parents got on board, crushing the cans to save space by driving over them in their car before Ryan bagged them up.
Like in the US, UK scrap metal firms pay between 10 and 50 cents per pound of aluminum, and last year Ryan collected eight tons of cans which raised around $7,300 for a women’s charity.
“Sometimes I think I’d rather be playing video games with my friends, because I’m 13 years old,” Ryan told the UK’s Southwest News Service. “But actually when I think about it more deeply, I really love what I do because I get to help people and families who are in need.”
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Over the last 3 years, Ryan has recycled an estimated 1.5 million cans which has amassed some $20,000, every penny of which he donated to charity, and has attracted so much attention that his family were given an industrial crushing machine which bundles Ryan’s cans into large metal bales that make it easy to transport and store.
Still in school, Ryan dedicates around 20 hours a week to his charity recycling, collecting cans after school and at weekends.
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“We are very proud of Ryan and really want to help him expand,” said Ryan’s mom Karima.
“The cans come from around 200 regular suppliers but we want to broaden that to many thousands. For the last three months we have recycled one ton per month but we are capable of much much more.”
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