LONDON, July 1 (Reuters) – China’s production of primary aluminium is closing in on last year’s record highs as previously idled capacity ramps up in Yunnan province. The country increased production by 5% year-on-year to 3.65 million metric tons in May, according to the latest estimate from the International Aluminium Institute.
National output is now running close to an annualised 43.0 million tons, within touching distance of the record highs seen in September and October last year.
A lack of affordable renewable energy jeopardizes a clean aluminum facility slated for Kentucky, which the U.S. needs to scale up clean energy manufacturing.
The clean energy revolution faces a critical bottleneck: a paradox with aluminum. This lightweight metal forms the backbone of electric vehicles, wind turbines, and solar panels, but its production demands substantial clean energy capacity. In order to reduce our overreliance on carbon intensive imports, we need to establish a clean domestic supply chain.
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Extrovert or introvert, buyer or builder, opportunistic or judicious. These are the existential questions that Rio Tinto must answer for itself as the global mining industry enters a new round of upheaval, driven by the lunge for metals critical to a low-carbon future. Which way will Rio, a primarily iron ore and aluminum producer, go?
No one knows, and there are enormous risks in both playing the mergers and acquisitions game and avoiding it. Rio knows it needs more copper – it is ranked a lowly eighth in terms of production. At the same time, its reputation for capital discipline and conservative thinking might make it shy away from bidding wars and hostile deals, perhaps even big mergers and acquisitions of the friendly variety.
The London Metal Exchange’s (LME) warning shot to those looking to game the new sanctions on Russian aluminum appears to have worked, for now at least. Traders swooped on the LME’s stocks of Russian brand aluminum after the US and UK governments banned exchanges from taking delivery of Russian metal produced after April 12.
Over half of registered tonnage was cancelled over the ensuing week, destined for a creative run-around that would see it re-warranted under more restrictive trading conditions and locked into a lucrative rent-sharing warehouse deal.
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Since Rio Tinto bought Canada’s Alcan in 2007, the Anglo-Australian mining giant has been good at making big promises, but slow to fulfill them. This is especially proving to be the case with its plan to produce zero-carbon aluminum.
The Quebec aluminum operations that Alcan built up over more than 80 years until its US$40-billion takeover by Rio Tinto remain among the world’s most profitable. Rio’s eight wholly and jointly owned smelters in the province mostly rely on cheap and emissions-free hydroelectric power from dams that Alcan itself built, providing a competitive and environmental advantage over U.S., Chinese and Russian rivals that use coal-based electricity.
https://missouriindependent.com/
The Magnitude 7 Metals plant employed more than 400 workers in Marston.
One of the nation’s last primary aluminum smelters, which employs more than 400 workers in the Missouri Bootheel, will reportedly close its doors.
The Magnitude 7 Metals plant, in the southeast Missouri town of Marston, announced Wednesday it would curtail operations, according to Industrious Labs, an industry analysis group. In a press release, Industrious Labs said the plant represents about one-fifth of the nation’s aluminum production.
https://www.thechemicalengineer.com/
ALUMINIUM producer Alcoa will fully curtail production at its 2.2 t/y alumina refinery in the Kwinana Industrial Area in Western Austria (WA) this year, after 60 years of operation. Matt Reed, chief operations officer and executive VP at Alcoa, said the decision was based on a variety of factors including age, scale, operating costs, current bauxite grades, and current market conditions.
It will see employees at the site phased down from around 800 at the start of 2024 to 250 by Q3, when all alumina production will cease. Alcoa said “certain processes” will continue until about Q3 of 2025, when the number of employees at the site will be further reduced to 50.
The London Metal Exchange (LME) is coming under renewed pressure to exclude Russian aluminum from its warehouse system. Norwegian producer Norsk Hydro has called for the exchange to reconsider its decision last November to continue accepting deliveries of Russian metal.
With Russian brands accounting for 80% of warranted aluminum stocks at the end of June, the LME contract is at risk of losing its benchmark status, Hydro warned. There are no government sanctions on Russian aluminum and the LME said in response that “we note that all metals of Russian origin continue to be consumed by a broad section of the market.”
(Bloomberg) — China’s aluminum producers are following in the footsteps of their nickel peers by setting up smelters in Indonesia.
After two decades of rapid growth, China’s aluminum sector is bumping up against a domestic capacity ceiling imposed by President Xi Jinping’s government. At the same time, Indonesia wants to do for aluminum something like what it’s done with its nickel: stop exporting raw ore and get foreign investors to build smelters.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Rio Tinto PLC is investing $1.4-billion to expand its aluminum manufacturing operations in Saguenay, Que., breathing new life into the industrial centre after years of uncertainty.
The Anglo-Australian mining giant said Monday it will build out a smelter that uses lower-carbon AP60 technology at its Complexe Jonquière site, adding 96 new pots to the existing 38 and increasing capacity to about 220,000 metric tonnes of primary aluminum per year. Pots are deep shells lined with carbon and insulating bricks in which aluminum is made through electrolysis.
Over a century ago, in December 1903, Wright Brothers’ first human-crewed flight took place onboard the Wright Flyer in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. It was the first powered, controlled, heavier-than-air airplane. The aircraft was built using wood, wires, and fabric on significant components. Since that time, major advancements in aircraft structural materials have been noticed. This article highlights the evolution of airframe materials and critical developments in recent times.
The Wright Brothers’ era
Various types of wood, metal wires, and fabrics of varying densities were used to manufacture the Wright Flyer. The Wrights used spruce for straight parts of the wings, such as wing spars. The ash wood was used for curved surfaces, including the ribs of the wings. The wooden frame was covered with a finely-woven cotton cloth, sealed with paraffin-based canvas paint. The metal fittings on the airframe were made from steel.
LONDON, June 5 (Reuters) – There was another raid on London Metal Exchange (LME) aluminium stocks last week. While headline inventory MALSTX-TOTAL fell by a marginal 1,475 tonnes over the holiday-shortened week, available stocks slumped by 19% thanks to 83,875 tonnes of net cancellations.
It was the second swoop on exchange stocks of aluminium in the space of a month after the mass cancellation of 132,700 tonnes of metal on May 10. LME on-warrant stocks have fallen from over 500,000 tonnes in the middle of April to a four-month low of 324,650 tonnes.
LONDON, May 23 (Reuters) – Aluminium is classified as a critical mineral by both the United States and the European Union. You wouldn’t know it from the perilous state of primary metal production on both sides of the Atlantic.
High energy costs, particularly in Europe, have caused multiple smelters to close or curtail output with the result that run-rates are the lowest this century. Back in 2020 the World Bank identified aluminium as a “high-impact” and “cross-cutting” metal in all existing and potential green energy technologies.
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Canada’s aluminum industry got its start in the Quebec town that U.S. industrialist Arthur Vining Davis built in the 1920s. A century later, Arvida – its name derived from the first letters of its founder’s name – is living on borrowed time.
The life of the Arvida aluminum smelter that opened in 1926, now owned by Rio Tinto, has been repeatedly extended in recent decades as the Quebec government reissued its operating permits even though the smelter belches out pollutants that far exceed provincial norms.
New York CNN — Suddenly, your beverage is taller. Beverage brands rely on packaging shape and design to draw in consumers. Now they’re counting on a new slew of skinny aluminum cans to subtly signal to consumers that their exotic new drinks are healthier than the beer and sodas in the short, round cans of old.
Topo Chico, Simply and SunnyD recently launched alcoholic seltzers and cocktails in tall, thin cans, while Day One, Celsius and Starbucks have debuted sparkling water and energy drinks in new slim cans. Coke with Coffee launched in a slim version last year, too.
