Emirates Aluminum Approves $4.5 Billion for Aluminum Smelter Expansion

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Written by Richard Finlayson, Senior International Editor for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Approval of a $4.5 billion investment plan by the board of Abu Dhabi's Emirates Aluminum (Emal) has given the go-ahead for a Phase II expansion project, which will see the company's aluminum smelter at Al Taweelha increase annual production capacity to 1.3 million tons of aluminum. This will make it one of the largest single-site smelters in the world.

Emal is a 50:50 joint venture of Dubai Aluminum Company (Dubai) and Mubadala Development Company, which is Abu Dhabi's state-owned investment vehicle.

The Phase II expansion will see the construction of a new potline at the Emal complex. This will entail increasing the dedicated, onsite power plant capacity to 3,000 megawatts and a line of 444 reduction cells. This will produce an additional annual production capacity of 520,000 tons.

The new generation DX+ reduction technology, which has been developed in-house by Dubai Aluminum, will be installed. This will operate at 420 kiloamps and will provide significant benefits in terms of energy-efficiency and environmental protection.

An upgrade on the technology installed in Emal Phase I will be undertaken at the same time as the expansion, which will result in an increase in the production yield from the existing 756 cells by 50,000 tons to 800,000 tons by the end of 2012. Work on Phase I and Phase II will see total production capacity raised to 1.3 million tons by the end of 2014. Saaed Fadhel Al Mazrooei, president and CEO of Emal, said that in only three years, Emal had become a global competitor in the aluminum industry, and Phase II would equip the company to grow the customer base they had established. He also said that it was a clear demonstration of the confidence the company had in the future market for aluminum.

Emal supplies customers in 36 countries. Production first started at the Al Taweelha plant in January.

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