This Thursday, 21 April 2011, I have the honor to speak to the Detroit-Windsor Chapter of the American Foundry Society ( afsdetroit.com ). The topic of my presentation is, “ADI- A Green Alternative”. Did you know that nearly 25% of a vehicle’s life-cycle energy is embodied in its manufacture? When you then consider battery and battery/hybrid vehicles the life cycle energy contained in the vehicle’s manufacture can rise to nearly 50%. Austempered Ductile Iron is a low energy material that can cost effectively replace aluminum and steel weldments, castings and forgings. Following the lead of the Architectural community I investigated the concept of “embodied energy”; the energy contained in a component from mining it, forming it, machining it and finishing it; through recycling…..all inclusive. The results showed a clear correlation between the embodied energy in a component and its price. Going further, one can calculate the embodied energy necessary to produce the components out of different material/process combinations to achieve the same mechanical results. In this presentation I will use case studies to demonstrate the concept of embodied energy and to compare Austempered Ductile Iron (ADI) to other, competing technologies. Join me at Vladimir’s for some good food, good friends and an ADI talk……what could be better?