Ait jan feb 2014

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25 years

January/February 2014 Volume 26 No 1

Promoting the aluminium industry for

THE JOURNAL OF ALUMINIUM PRODUCTION AND PROCESSING

TODAY

NEWS

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PRIMARY

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EXTRUSION

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TRANSPORT & HANDLING

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CONTENTS 1

www.aluminiumtoday.com

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LEADER

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NEWS

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AluSolutions: Sustainability in the aluminium industry

UPDATES Volume 26 No. 1 – January/F ebruary 2014 Editorial Editor: Nadine Firth Tel: +44 (0) 1737 855115 nadinefirth@quartzltd.com

COVER

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North America - Meeting growing demand

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South America - The Brazilian aluminium industry’s GHG emissions

January/February 2014 Volume 26 No 1

Consulting Editor: Tim Smith PhD, CEng, MIM

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Promoting the aluminium industry for

years

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THE JOURNAL OF ALUMINIUM PRODUCTION AND PROCESSING

industry

Production Editor: Annie Baker

TODAY

Sales International Sales Manager: Paul Rossage paulrossage@quartzltd.com Tel: +44 (0)1737 855116

China - Power prices and China’s aluminium

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Russia - Creating value through R&D

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Middle East - Arabal highlights need for SMEs

INTERVIEW

Area Sales Manager: Anne Considine anneconsidine@quartzltd.com Tel: +44 (0)1737 855139

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Sales Director: Ken Clark kenclark@quartzltd.com Tel: +44 (0)1737 855117

Marco Palmieri, Novelis

MINING & REFINING 27

Advertisement Production Production Executive: Martin Lawrence martinlawrence@quartzltd.com

alumina refineries

Marketing

NEWS

Marketing Executive: Annie O’Brien annieobrien@quartzltd.com Tel: +44 (0)1737 855012

Sustainability aspects of bauxite deposits and

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PRIMARY

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EXTRUSION

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PRIMARY

TRANSPORT & HANDLING

Cover picture courtesy of Dubal

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The key to success: Continuous improvements

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Kitimat project: Case study

Circulation/subscriptions Elizabeth Barford Tel +44 (0) 1737 855028 Fax +44 (0) 1737 855034 email subscriptions@quartzltd.com Annual subscription: UK £211, all other countries £230. For two year subscription: UK £380, all other countries £414. Airmail prices on request.

Single copies £39

SUSTAINABILITY 36

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Supporters of Aluminium International Today

Sustainability schemes

EXTRUSION 39

The comeback commodity: Part II

TRANSPORT & HANDLING 43 ALUMINIUM INTERNATIONAL TODAY is published six times a year by Quartz Business Media Ltd, Quartz House, 20 Clarendon Road, Redhill, Surrey, RH1 1QX, UK. Tel: +44 (0) 1737 855000 Fax: +44 (0) 1737 855034 Email: aluminium@quartzltd.com Aluminium International Today (USO No; 022-344) is published bi-monthly by Quartz Business Ltd and distributed in the US by DSW, 75 Aberdeen Road, Emigsville, PA 17318-0437. Periodicals postage paid at Emigsville, PA. POSTMASTER: send address changes to Aluminium International c/o PO Box 437, Emigsville, PA 17318-0437.

Printed in the UK by: Pensord, Tram Road, Pontlanfraith, Blackwood, Gwent, NP12 2YA, UK

Warehousing and handling issues solved ˘ for Çuhadaroglu

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Truck transportation

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Hot metal transport

ROLLING 54

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59

Problem solving at a cold rolling mill

AUTOMOTIVE 56

Aluminium manufacturers set for automotive boom

© Quartz Business Media Ltd 2014

PERSPECTIVES 59 ISSN 1475-455X

Aluminium International Today

@AluminiumToday

Martin Jarrett, Technology Director, Constellium January/February 2014

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2 COMMENT

INDUSTRY NEWS

www.aluminiumtoday.com

$385m rolling mill opens

Nadine Firth Editor New year, new face A new year signals change and I’ve also heard it can ‘do you good’, so we have taken this on board at Quartz Business Media and here I am!

The previous editor Matthew Moggridge has moved over to our Steel Times publication and I join you from Glass International, on which I have worked as the assistant editor for the past two years.

I haven’t even moved desks; I’ve just discarded the numerous empty wine bottles that I had accumulated (a perk of being in the glass industry) and replaced these with a small aluminium ingot and some delicate aluminium roses from the guys at ALFED. However, there is hope that my desk could once again make room for some wine freebies, with the launch of a new aluminium can bottle range from Barokes. The Lovers Wine can bottles will be marketed first in China and thanks to the benefits of aluminium as a packaging material, they are durable, safe, resealable, single serve, quick to chill and environmentally friendly.

As I get to grips with the role I will be attending as many industry events as possible, starting with the TMS Annual M eeting & Exhibition in San Diego on 16th - 20th February 2014.

Please get in touch if you would like to set up a meeting to discuss editorial or any other opportunities in the magazine going forward. nadinefirth@quartzltd.com

January/February 2014

The Oman Aluminium Rolling Company LLC (OARC), one of the largest projects in the aluminium processing industry in the Sultanate, officially opened under the patronage of Dr Mohammed bin Hamad al Rumhy , Minister of Oil and Gas. The OARC official inauguration took place at the end of December 2013 at the company’s headquarters in Sohar Industrial Estate and was attended by Hilal al Kharusi, chairman of OARC; Buddy Stemple, CEO of OARC; and senior government officials and

representatives of private-sector organisations.

Highlighting the potential of the plant, Stemple said: “W e proudly unveil this high-scale project which is meant to not only meet the needs of the local market but to also be a major competitor in the regional and international markets.

“I am very proud to be part of this project, and I am looking forward to the commencement of our commercial operations. OARC is, without doubt, an Omani brand with international standards.”

Owned by Takamul Investment

Company with a total cost of $385 million, the OARC plant supplies alloys of processed aluminium to the local markets and exports to the M iddle East, Asia, Europe, Australia, North and South America.

The project provides around 300 direct job opportunities for local residents, and recorded current Omanisation percentage of 73%, with 100% Omanisation on the plant operations level.

It has an annual capacity of 140,000 tonnes of multi-purpose aluminium sheets.

China tiered power pricing China is set to impose tiered power pricing on all aluminium smelters starting from January 2014 in an attempt to weed out inefficient plants and tackle severe overcapacity in the sector.

The aluminum industry has been suffering from overcapacity for years, depressing prices and forcing many producers, including Aluminum Corp of China Ltd (Chalco), to suffer heavy losses.

The move to revise power tariffs, which account for about 40% of a smelter's operating costs, is the latest in a series of measures to slim the sector and comes as Beijing has vowed to let market forces play a decisive role in the allocation of resources.

Power prices will remain unchanged for smelters that do not use more than 13,700 kilowatts (KWs) for each tonne of aluminium produced, while those that use between 13,700 - 13,800 KWs will be charged an additional 0.02 yuan per K W, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said in a statement.

Smelters that consume more than 13,800 K Ws of power for each tonne of aluminium produced will be charged an additional 0.08 yuan per K W, the NDRC said.

Plants that exceed the 13,700 KWs/tonne threshold will also be barred from direct negotiations

with power companies for lower energy prices.

The NDRC said local governments must not arbitrarily reduce power prices for aluminium companies and must stop all previously offered subsidies.

Local governments must also stop giving fee deductions and other incentives to smelters that are equipped with their own power generators.

China currently has about 30 million tonnes of primary aluminium smelting capacity annually, but less than 24 million tonnes of yearly capacity operated in November 2013, based on official production data.

Russian plant to increase powder production Aluminium producer UC Rusal has announced plans to invest €4 million to modernise its SU AL powder metallurgy plant in Shelekhov, Russia.

The plant is to acquire a HOSOKAWA Alpine classifier mill, which will help increase production capacity by 30% as well as launching a new range of ultrahigh quality aluminium powders.

The material is used in construction, in particular in the

production of autoclave aerocrete.

The installation of the new equipment is part of a broader modernisation of the aluminium powder production project.

Assembly works are being carried out at the plant, scheduled to complete in January 2014 and the new equipment will run at full capacity in August 2014.

“The introduction of a wide range of water-retention powders and pastes will enhance our

position within the market,” said Alexey Arnautov , director of UC Rusal's Aluminium Division West.

“The new classifier mill will not only improve the quality of our products and process safety significantly, but also increase the plant's monthly production capacity in terms of particle composition aluminium powders used in aerocrete production by up to 120 tonnes.”

For up-to-date news & views www.aluminiumtoday.com Aluminium International Today

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INDUSTRY NEWS 3

IN BRIEF

Rolling aluminum on the hot mill at Oswego, NY

Novelis auto investment Novelis will invest an additional $205 million to further expand its global manufacturing operations serving the rapidly growing automotive market.

The company will build new finishing lines at its plants in Oswego, N.Y. and Nachterstedt, Germany, dedicated to the production of aluminium automotive sheet.

The two new lines will each have a capacity of 120,000 metric tons per year.

The latest expansions are in response to the escalating global demand from automakers for aluminium sheet, which the company expects to grow by more than 30% per year through the

end of the decade. When the new lines are commissioned in late 2015, Novelis' global automotive sheet capacity will reach approximately 900,000 tons per year, a three-fold increase from just a year ago.

The company is investing around the world to boost its automotive finishing capabilities. In addition to the two new lines, the company recently commissioned two new finishing lines at its Oswego, N.Y. plant. In addition, a new plant is under construction in Changzhou, China, which is expected to commence production in mid2014. The company also recently certified automotive production at its Gottingen, Germany, plant that

complements the company's existing automotive facilities in Kingston, Ontario, Canada; Sierre, Switzerland and Nachterstedt, Germany.

Both expansions will further the ongoing development of the company's automotive closed-loop business model. Today, as much as 50% of automotive sheet sold to automakers is left over after a manufacturing plant stamps out automotive parts. The company is working closely with its customers to return this material directly back to Novelis for recycling, streamlining the materials supply chain while reducing the total carbon footprint of the entire automotive production cycle.

Alba record production Aluminium Bahrain (Alba) has achieved a production record of 912,700 metric tonnes in 2013, a leap of 22,483 tonnes from the 890,217 tonnes produced in 2012.

A ceremony to mark this milestone was held at the HRH Princess Sabeeka Oasis on 5th January 2014.

It was attended by Alba’s chief

executive Tim Murray, chief operations officer Isa Al Ansari, chief financial officer Ali Al Baqali, chief marketing officer Jean Baptiste Lucas, members of Alba’s Labour Union as well as management staff and company employees.

Tim Murray said: “Alba was able to exceed 900,000 metric tonnes per annum (mtpa) for the first time

in its 40-year history , which is the result of the dedication of its hard working and loyal employees. W e feel this increase in productivity is directly linked to the improvement in safety performance.

“As we look into 2014, we expect to go even higher in terms of operational improvements and plant reliability,” he said.

Barokes aluminium can bottle range Australian wine producer, Barokes Wines, has launched the Lovers Wine range of quality lower alcohol wines in aluminium can bottles.

Using the slim can bottle technology developed by the Daiwa Can Company, who partnered with Barokes just over 12 months ago, and incorporating Barokes’ globally patented Vinsafe wine packaging system, this product range is designed to appeal to a new generation of wine consumers.

With all the benefits of an aluminium can, the Lovers W ine Aluminium International Today

range has the appearance and premium feel previously only conveyed by conventional glass wine bottles.

The Lovers W ine can bottles are durable, safe, resealable, single serve, quick to chill and environmentally friendly.

China will be one of the first markets to launch the Lovers Wine range following the recent partnership between Barokes and COFCO Corporation, a stateowned enterprise and China’s

Sohar Aluminium appoints new CEO

largest food processing, manufacturer and trader.

COFCO will be distributing the Lovers W ine range and other Barokes wines throughout mainland China under an exclusive agreement signed in September 2013.

Said M ohammed al M asoudi has been appointed as the new chief executive officer (CEO) of Sohar Aluminium (SA) with effect from 18th December 2013.

Announcing the appointment, Sohar Aluminium’s chairman, Mulham al Jarf said: “Said has been with SA for many years and played a major role in enabling the company to achieve its goals. W e are confident that his experience and expertise will enable the company to reach even greater heights of excellence.”

Commenting on his appointment, Al M asoudi said: “I am truly honoured to be selected by the board of directors of SA to lead the executive management team. Together we will continue working with the same level of diligence, care and enthusiasm to deliver the mission and vision entrusted to SA.”

Aluminium enables cheaper hydrogen production French scientists have produced hydrogen by accelerating natural processes taking place in rocks deep below the Earth’s surface, possibly opening new avenues for hydrogen production.

The team from the University Claude Bernard in L yon, France, used aluminium oxide to speed up the process by which hydrogen is naturally produced when water interacts with olivine, a common type of rock, under high temperatures and pressures found deep underground.

Published recently in the journal American M ineralogist, the discovery could pave the way for considerably cheaper hydrogen production.

For up-to-date news & views www.aluminiumtoday.com January/February 2014

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IN BRIEF Ma’aden restarts aluminium plant line Saudi Arabian Mining Company has restarted one of the two potlines at its new aluminium smelter in Saudi Arabia.

The USD 10.8 billion plant at Ras al-Khair , a JV between M a'aden and US based Alcoa, shut one of its smelting lines in mid October 2013 due to problems encountered during a ramp up of production.

Ma'aden in a Saudi stock market statement said: “The ramp up and increase of the first potline production is expected to reach production capacity within the second quarter of 2014.”

Change to miner’s board of Australian Bauxite

Alcoa signs long-term Airbus agreement Alcoa has signed a multi-year supply agreement with Airbus valued at approximately $110 million for value-added titanium and aluminium aerospace forgings.

The company will produce the parts using its recently modernised 50,000-ton press in Cleveland, Ohio, USA. This press uses state-ofthe-art controls to meet stringent aerospace specifications and according to the company , is capable of producing the world’s largest and most complex titanium, nickel, steel and aluminium forgings.

“Our expertise innovating highly

engineered products, long history in aerospace, and the unmatched capabilities of our 50,000-ton press make Alcoa uniquely qualified to produce high-end solutions for the most advanced aircraft,” said Olivier Jarrault, executive vice president and Alcoa group president, engineered products and solutions.

“This agreement deepens our long and collaborative relationship with Airbus with whom we will continue working to advance the industry with superior products.”

Alcoa will supply titanium parts, including forgings used to connect

Picture courtesy of Alcoa

4 INDUSTRY NEWS

the wing structure to the engine, for the A320neo, Airbus’s most fuel-efficient single-aisle jet.

The agreement also includes several large aluminium forgings for the A330 and A380 - including the A380 inner rear wing spar , which is the largest aerospace forging in the world - that will be made using Alcoa’s proprietary 7085 alloy intended specifically for large structural aircraft components. M ost of these forgings support the wing structure where strength-to-weight ratio is critical to efficient flight performance.

Championing aluminium in the automotive industry Paul Lennon has joined the board of a Sydney -based company planning to mine bauxite near Launceston.

Australian Bauxite Ltd has three exploration tenements in the North and hopes to open a mine and export bauxite to China for smelting.

The company has signed an agreement with Chinese aluminium refiner Xinfa.

Constellium to supply to The Boeing Company Under a new agreement, Constellium will supply The Boeing Company aluminium products for airframes utilising Constellium’s current and advanced-generation aluminium alloys. The contract notably includes the continued supply of AIRWARE, Constellium’s lowdensity Aluminium- Lithium solution, for the Boeing 787 Dreamliner airplane.

For up-to-date News & Views www.aluminiumtoday.com

January/February 2014

Thousands of new jobs would be created if the British Government stepped forward to champion aluminium as the modern automotive metal.

That was the message delivered to MPs at a special P arliamentary briefing by motoring expert and fuel campaigner Quentin Willson.

Quentin was speaking on behalf of ALFED, the trade association which represents UK aluminium manufacturers and suppliers.

At present 20,000 people are employed in aluminium manufacturing and supply in Britain, generating a £3.2 billion annual turnover . As the most abundant metal on Earth, 75% of aluminium ever made is still in use today.

He told P arliamentarians: “W e

have the chance to develop a fantastic industry in aluminium in the UK which would create thousands of new jobs.

“What we really need now is the Government to champion aluminium development and acceptance in the UK as the modern automotive metal. It can do that by looking at tax benefits supporting research and development and reducing scrap exports to protect the British resource.”

ALFED CEO Will Savage said the sector was within reach of a bright future due to the explosion in demand in the automotive industry and other sectors.

But he warned: “We really need government to get behind British aluminium manufacturers and

suppliers.

“Since 2007 we have lost 85% of our primary production capacity and what remains is not being helped by EU rules which place smelters inside the union at an 11% cost disadvantage compared to those outside.”

A recent report by the Centre for European Policy Studies said plants fully exposed to EU climate and energy policies have seen an 11% increase in production costs, making them the least competitive globally.

Will added: “In order to sustain and grow our industry, we need a supply of qualified technicians, a review of energy taxation, secure energy supplies and better incentives to divert scrap exports to UK markets.”

Importance of foil New figures show that the worldwide aluminium foil production currently accounts for 12% of global primary aluminium output, making it a key product for the sector.

These figures underline the importance of the third Global Aluminium Foil Roller Conference

(GLAFCO) 2014.

Commenting on the figures, Manfred Mertens, the conference chairman said: “These figures are a timely reminder of the significant role the alufoil industry continues to play and its importance to the future prosperity of aluminium production.

“Despite the economic troubles of recent years production of foil has continued to utilise significant quantities of primary output and, as the recovery gathers pace, in the next five years we expect almost 20% more primary metal devoted to both thin and thicker gauge production,” he added.

Aluminium International Today

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6 INDUSTRY NEWS

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European aluminium beverage can recycling at record level A recent report has shown the overall recycling rate for aluminium beverage cans in the EU 27 + EFTA countries increased by 2.4% points to a new record level of 68% in 2011. If the collection of cans in the remaining European countries and Turkey is included, this means that more than 25 billion cans are recycled in Europe annually.

This represents a total amount of 365,000 tons of recycled aluminium, avoiding 3 million tonnes of greenhouse gas

emissions.

The European Aluminium Association (EAA) is confident that the aluminium beverage can recycling rate will further increase towards the voluntary targets set by the industry for 2015 (75%) and 2020 (80%). However, in order to achieve these ambitious levels, it is important for the full value chain involved in the recycling of cans to continue to invest in existing and additional collection and sorting facilities

In view of the upcoming revision of the EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive, the EAA stresses the need for more ambitious household packaging recycling goals, including the gradual phasing-out of landfill of all recyclables such as aluminium (and other metal) packaging. Additional recovery of metals from the bottom ashes of waste incinerators are a useful but ‘second best’ option. Preference should be given to separate collection.

Trimet acquires Rio Tinto Alcan plants Trimet Aluminium SE has acquired two production plants in F rance from Rio Tinto Alcan.

In July 2013, the company made a binding offer to take over and continue production at the aluminium plants in Saint-Jean-deMaurienne and Castelsarrasin.

The acquisition has now been approved by the national and European regulatory authorities.

Alongside the main shareholder , Trimet Aluminium SE, the F rench energy provider EDF holds a minority stake in T rimet F rance SAS.

At both locations, some 500 employees produce aluminium wire, which is processed into electrical lines for the energy sector, among other uses, and into connectors for the automotive industry.

By entering into this product segment, Trimet is expanding its product portfolio.

“There is great demand for aluminium wire in the European processing industry. By supplying complex alloys and customised solutions, we are strengthening our long-term core competence as

Novelis to sell North American foil business Novelis Inc., has signed a definitive agreement for the sale of its North American consumer foil products business to Reynolds Consumer Products, Inc. The transaction includes foil manufacturing plants in Toronto, ON, and V ancouver, B C, in addition to sales offices and distribution facilities located in M ontreal, QC; M ississauga, ON; and LaGrange, Ga. The purchase price is $35 million, subject to customary adjustments.

“The North America consumer foil products business is a successful part of our company; however, it is not aligned with

January/February 2014

Novelis’ growth strategy . Our primary focus is to continue our growth in the premium markets of automotive, beverage cans and specialty products, and to expand our recycling leadership,” said M arco P almieri, Senior Vice President and President of Novelis North America.

Over the past three years, Novelis has invested $1.7 billion in global expansions to serve these markets.

The sale of Novelis’ consumer foil products business is subject to receipt of regulatory and other customary approvals.

Dr Martin Iffert, Trimet’s CEO

a specialty supplier within this product group,” said Dr M artin Iffert, CEO of T rimet Aluminium SE, who will manage the fortunes of Trimet France SAS as President of the company.

Decision due on Port Henry Alcoa’s P ort Henry aluminium smelter in Geelong, Victoria, Australia will have a review of its operations handed down in March 2014, with jobs of more than 500 employees to go if the struggling plant closes.

The Geelong plant was bailed out to the tune of $40 million by the previous government in June 2012 on the condition it stay open until at least June 2014.

The smelter’s closure would be another hit to Geelong, with Royal Dutch Shell announcing last year that its refinery was up for sale and Ford Australia is to close its engine plant in 2016.

MQP agreement

R-L Phil Enright, N-Tec and John Courtenay, MQP

M QP Ltd, based in Knowle, UK, has recently entered into a worldwide agreement with N-Tec, Metallurgical Services.

M QP is actively involved in a number of projects that focus on the quality of metal in casthouses worldwide. These include optimising the grain refining process using the Opticast system in conjunction with a grain refiner, Optifine, development and evaluation of novel three chamber filtration systems incorporating the addition of grain refiner to one chamber, and casthouse programmes aimed at the audit, characterisation and enhancement of melt quality and cleanliness.

The work on melt quality and cleanliness has been carried out in co-operation with N- Tec Limited, which specialises in molten metal quality management.

N-Tec provides a metal quality benchmarking service known as FootPrinting, which generates profiles of metal quality in terms of dissolved gas and inclusions and compares them with its database of worldwide industrial product profiles collected over the last 15 years. F ootPrints are the statistical average of all the individual data in the NTec database and provide a very powerful quality management tool.

M QP and N- Tec have now pooled their resources and expertise to extend and improve the melt quality audit and benchmarking service into industrial casthouses worldwide.

Together they are currently introducing a control charting software, called MeltClean, which can be used to determine a unique metal quality index from data generated on a Prefil F ootprinter machine.

Aluminium International Today

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INDUSTRY NEWS 7

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DIARY 2014 February 16-20 TMS Now in its 143rd year, The Materials Society (TMS) Annual conference and exposition meets at the San Diego Convention Centre, USA in 2014. For more information, visit: www.tms.org/meetings/annua l-14/AM14home.aspx

Aldel applies for bankruptcy Dutch smelter Aluminium Delfzijl (Aldel) has applied for bankruptcy after failing to negotiate an energy deal.

Aldel, bought by global industrial commodities company

Klesch Group in 2009, applied for bankruptcy in a Dutch court on 30th December 2013 and had expected a decision on the same day.

Klesch said in October 2013 that

the Dutch regional government of Groningen had agreed to loan Adel 7 million euros ($9.6 million) to finalise a long-term deal to connect Adel to the German power grid.

WWW.BUSSCORP.COM

March 17-19 North American Aluminium Trends 2014 CRU is holding the 21st North American Aluminum Trends Conference at the Biltmore, Coral Gables. It will be colocating with the Aluminum Extruders Council this year. www.crugroup.com/events/na aluminumtrends May 13-15 6th International Conference on Electrodes for Primary Aluminium Smelters Taking place in ReykjavĂ­k, Iceland, the conference will focus on both anodes and cathodes. Emphasis will be on environmental issues, increasing productivity and future prospects in the aluminium industry.

There will also be a tabletop exhibition. www.rodding-conference.is 19-20 World Aluminium China CRU's World Aluminium Conference attracts delegates involved in smelting, recycling, rolling, extruding, trade, raw materials, purchasing, technology and finance. www.crugroup.com/events/al uminium2014/ June 11-13 METEF An international metals exhibition covering extrusions, diecasting, foundry, rolling, finishing, machining, fabricating and recycling. www.metef.com/ENG/home.asp For a full listing visit www.aluminiumtoday.com and click on Events Diary

Aluminium International Today

The leading Mixing Technology for Anode Pastes For over 50 years BUSS KE and CP series Kneaders have been the benchmark for reliable, cost-effective compounding of anode pastes. Now we go one step further.

Alu Solutions_30_AIT_0110 1/10/14 11:21 AM Page 1

ALUSOLUTIONS 2013 9

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AluSolutions:

Sustainability in the aluminium industry More than 1000 visitors from across the aluminium industry attended the first CIAC event at the Palais des congrès in Montreal, Canada on 22nd – 24th October 2013, which included the first AluSolutions exhibition and conference.

The event also played host to INALCO, the REGAL Students’ day (JER) 2013, and the AAC cocktail party.

While the AluSolutions exhibition provided a platform to discuss solutions to common industry issues and explore the latest developments for aluminium production and processing, the conference ran a full two-day programme, with sessions dedicated to sustainability in the aluminium industry.

The exhibition provided a showcase for more than 70 exhibiting companies, which included Alcoa, Rio Tinto Alcan, Wagstaff, Aluminerie Alouette, and Fives Solios, to name a few.

completed Emal smelter, which is located in the Khalifa Industrial Zone Abu Dhabi (KIZAD) at Al Taweelah.

Before construction began, Emal undertook an environmental assessment and carried out a wildlife translocation exercise to protect local fauna and flora.

The company also invested heavily in the latest technology to minimise its

environmental impact.

A further presentation from Raymond M arcoux, VP , business development, Aluminium SNC Lavalin, explained how the Emal project was built ahead of schedule and under budget.

Mining and refining

A further session on day one looked at the

Conference

It was standing room only for the AluSolutions conference, which was organised by Aluminium International Today. The programme was designed to explore sustainable production techniques and practices for the aluminium industry.

Speakers from companies including Emirates Aluminium (Emal), FATA Hunter, SNC Lavalin, Danieli Corus, Hatch Ltd and Alcoa Inc, discussed their own experiences of implementing green technologies in smelters across the world, along with processes designed to benefit smelters looking to reduce their carbon footprint.

GCC smelters

One of the first conference sessions focussed on how the GCC smelters are setting new environmental standards and to demonstrate this, Mohammed Al Jawi, environment manager , Emal, gave a detailed presentation on the recently Aluminium International Today

January/February 2014

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10 ALUSOLUTIONS 2013

www.aluminiumtoday.com

Pictured L-R: Mohammed Al Jawi, Emal; Pauline Plisson, Fives Solios; Stephan Broek, Hatch Ltd; David Roth, GPS Global Solutions; Peter Verbraak, Danieli Corus; Caio Moreira Van Deursen, Votorantim Metals.

environmental developments in mining and refining, with a presentation by PeterHans ter Weer, proprietor TWS Consulting, on ‘Sustainability aspects of bauxite deposits and alumina refineries’.

The paper explored the background of sustainability in the mining and minerals industry and provided an exploration of the relationship between sustainability and quality criteria for bauxite deposits. An abridged version of this paper can be found in this issue.

Excellence, looked at ‘How Alcoa is recycling dross generated at its smelters and avoiding costly treatment and the use of land filling’.

Other presentations, such as the one given by Hatch Ltd’s Stephan Broek, director, environmental engineering and technology, looked at a new emissions

model to help reduce emissions in existing smelter operations.

Presentations available

A downloadable pdf of individual presentations is available through the AluSolutions website: www.alusolutions.com/conference ᔢ

Technological trends

Day two concentrated on technological trends in reducing smelter emissions. The first presentation by F rançois Racine, business development manager , Alcoa Innovation and F rancis Caron, project manager Alcoa Casthouse Center of

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Aluminium International Today

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12 NORTH AMERICA UPDATE

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Meeting growing demand As proof that aluminium has become a critical material for this current era, officers of the Aluminium Association told reporters recently that the light metal has seen increasing use in the automotive space, as well as for “green” building and in consumer electronics. By Myra Pinkham*

“It is all about growth and sustainability,” Layle “Kip” Smith, chief executive officer of Noranda Aluminium, who is also chairman of the association, maintains.

On the growth front, he notes that demand for aluminium in the United States and Canada is up 30% from the depths of the global recession.

“In fact it is approaching the record levels that were set in the mid 2000s,” he declares.

The group’s November Aluminium Situation stated that its preliminary estimates of demand (shipments by domestic producers plus imports) for the first nine months of 2013 was 18,382 million pounds, which is up 1% compared with the first three quarters of 2012.

The association estimate that demand for aluminium semi-fabricated mill products was 1,368 million pounds in September, up 1.6% from a year earlier with sheet and plate up 0.2% year on year to 768 million pounds, extruded products up 6.8% to 371 million pounds and castings (for exports and other uses) up 22% year on year to 714 million pounds.

He says perhaps the biggest story has been the automotive sector, where there has been 40 years of uninterrupted growth in aluminium use in North American light vehicles, including about a 12% growth rate from 2011 to 2012.

For 2013, industry analysts are predicting the North American auto output will reach about 16.2 million cars and light trucks, up from 15.4 million vehicles in 2012 and a low of 8.6 million vehicles in 2009, at the depth of the recession. It is anticipated that auto output will grow

further to about 16.5 million vehicles in 2014 and as high as 17.3 million vehicles in 2015 and that they could jump to a record 18 million vehicles in the next decade or so.

But it isn’t just auto unit growth that is expected to benefit the aluminium industry, but also moves by automakers to lightweight vehicles to meet more stringent fuel efficiency and carbon dioxide emissions regulations.

Smith says that in September the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory released a study showing that aluminium intensive vehicles can achieve a 29% reduction of carbon dioxide emissions compared with typical steel intensive vehicles on the road today.

“Because of this there are expectations that aluminium consumption by the automotive market will double by 2025,” Smith says.

Much of this growth is expected to be in auto sheet. Aluminium analyst Lloyd O’Carroll, says that this is a potential game changer for the aluminium flat rolled industry, predicting that the market for aluminium auto body sheet in the United States, which was under 0.2 billion pounds last year, will reach about 1 billion pounds in 2014, 2 billion pounds in 2020 and between 3.2 billion to 6.4 billion pounds by 2025.

Additional rolling capacity is being created, and will continue to be created to meet this demand, Randall Scheps, global marketing director for Alcoa Inc. and chairman of the association’s aluminium transportation group, says, adding, “The issue is making sure that the aluminium

producers are involved with the car companies early in their planning cycles to make sure there is time to create that capacity.”

He notes that currently Alcoa is investing just under $600 million in auto sheet capacity in North America ($300 million in Davenport, Iowa, and $275 million in Tennessee), as well as in developing auto sheet capabilities at its new Ma’aden joint venture in Saudi Arabia. Others are making similar moves – or considering doing so.

Novelis Inc., for example, has invested $200 million to up the continuous heattreating and finishing capacity at its Oswego, N.Y., facility.

“There is potential for tightness of supply for other aluminium end markets, especially between now and 2018,” Scheps admits. “As you get some very large volume car programmes coming online it is natural for some spot tightness to develop,” he says, explaining that it can’t be expected that the new production capacity will be exactly matched with the growth in demand.

Another bright spot for growth is the building and construction sector .

According to Heidi Brock, the association’s president, “Aluminium contributes to the great environmental and energy benefits of green buildings, so we are very optimistic about the growth in that sector as well.”

There has been and continues to be growth in other “green” applications, Smith says that with aluminium’s weight to performance ratio it is a material of choice for high powered transmission. He explains that wind power and other alternative energy needs to connect to the

*North American correspondent January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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NORTH AMERICA UPDATE 13

W E

C O N V E Y

Q U A L I T Y

DeďŹ ned Cooling of Hot Bath Material Norsk Hydro, supplier of extruded and precision aluminium products for the automotive and building industries

power grid and that as that demand grows aluminium will be essential for the transmission wire involved in doing so. “Aluminium is also a material of choice for transformers and transformer wiring,� he declares. “W e are glad to be able to support power grid applications where the use of aluminium is economically viable.�

The sustainability of using aluminium is another important part of using aluminium for energy applications, according to Etienne Jacques, chief operating officer of Rio Tinto Alcan Primary Metal North America and an Aluminium Association board member . “Being fully recyclable, the sustainability of aluminium can create jobs and support economic growth.�

Brock says there has also been significant growth in the use of aluminium both in consumer electronics and in the electrical sector, including for wire and cable. “There has been double digit growth in the electrical connector sector, she says.

Jacques says that the industry has been developing different types of alloys, which will open up doors for new applications for aluminium than those that are currently being considered.

It is also possible that alloys can be used in different applications than those they were originally developed for. One example of this has been alloy 1785, notes Kevin Lowery, an Alcoa spokesman. That alloy , he explains, was originally developed specifically for the Airbus A380.

It has, however, been used for certain defence aircraft, such as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, and for certain armour applications and not it is being considered for certain consumer electronics applications because of its durability.

Smith says that the Aluminium Association plans to release an economic impact study that will highlight aluminium’s role in US job generation and its role in supporting the US manufacturing base. The group is also working on an aluminium semi-fabricated product lifecycle assessment report, which, he says, is expected to show significant improvement in the industry’s environmental footprint.

This comes at the same time as the industry continues to make progress in achieving a 75% aluminium beverage container recycling rate by 2015. Currently, according to the most recent data released by the Aluminium Association, the Can M anufacturers Institute and the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, 67% of aluminium cans were recycled in 2012, its highest recycling rate since the early 1990s. ᔢ January/February 2014

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14 SOUTH AMERICA UPDATE

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The Brazilian aluminium industry’s GHG emissions The debate on the required adjustments that industries should engage to adapt to the low carbon economy paradigm is a hot issue for most natural resource based activities, and the Brazilian aluminium sector is no exception. This article highlights an independent report (written by Getúlio Vargas Foundation/FGV, a leading Brazilian think-thank), sponsored by the Brazilian government.

By Germano Mendes de Paula*

Picture courtesy of Flickr

The main goal of the mentioned report is to provide technical support to the government, which has been involved in the elaboration of the so-called “Industry Plan” that, for its turn, is part of the National Policy on Climate Change.

Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions were the key investigated feature. The study emphasised scope 1 (all direct GHG emissions) and scope 2 (indirect GHG emissions from consumption of purchased electricity, heat or steam). Consequently, it excluded scope 3 (other indirect emissions, such as the extraction and production of purchased materials and fuels, transportrelated activities in vehicles not owned or controlled by the reporting entity , outsourced activities, waste disposal etc).

Concerning the aluminium value chain, the report examined alumina and primary aluminium production, which is equivalent to 89% of the GHG emissions generated by the Brazilian sector.

Thus, it does not evaluate neither some upstream (bauxite mining), nor some downstream activities (manufacturing of aluminium products, aluminium recycling and transport).

Conclusions

FGV’s report showed various disaggregated data on GHG emissions for the Brazilian aluminium industry . F or

Country

CO2 intensity (t CO2/t Al)

CF4 intensity (kg CF 4/t Al)

C2F6 intensity (kg C 2F6/t Al)

GHG intensity (T CO2 eq/t Al)

Germany

1.37

0.047

0.005

1.72

Australia

1.61

0.033

0.004

1.86

Spain

1.66

0.043

0.003

1.96

Iceland

1.49

0.080

0.010

2.11

Brazil

1.65

0.071

0.006

2.17

Norway

1.60

0.082

0.008

2.20

Canada

1.65

0.098

0.007

2.36

France

1.66

0.014

0.028

2.66

Russia

1.73

0.131

0.009

2.66

USA

1.66

0.192

0.027

3.16

Table 1 Intensity of GHG emissions for producing primary aluminium in selected countries.

Source: Carboclima (2011) quoted by Getúlio Vargas Foundation (2013)

instance, the CO 2 intensity in the production of primary aluminium has diminished from 1,709 tCO 2/t Al in 1990 to 1,666 in 1996 and has maintained around the same level up to 2007, the latest available data. M eanwhile, the generation of kilogram of CF4 per ton of aluminium has decreased from 0.328 in 1990 to 0.071 in 2007, while the respective figures for kilogram of C2F6 per ton of aluminium were 0.0286 and 0.006.

The enhancement of emissions varied in accordance with the technology. For CF4 intensity, along the period 1990-2007, Soderberg plants achieved a 75% progress and Prebake, 81%. The respective figures

for C2F6 were 73.5% and 82%.

Nonetheless, in the case of CO 2, both technologies had a similar upgrading of 3.1%. It should be remembered that Prebake has a diffusion of 56% in the Brazilian aluminium sector , whilst the Soderberg has the remaining 44%. Other empirical evidences on improved performance were also provided.

Other interesting data, reproduced as Table 1 , demonstrates a comparison of the CO2, CF4, C2F6 and GHG intensity for major aluminium producers, with the important exceptions of China and India.

Among the 10 countries listed in Table 1, Brazil has an intermediate position,

*Professor in Economics, Federal University of Uberlândia, Brazil January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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16 SOUTH AMERICA UPDATE

because it has the fourth lowest CF4 and C2F6 intensities and, more importantly, the fifth lowest CO2 and GHG ratios.

Future perspectives

FGV discussed two scenarios of production for the Brazilian aluminium industry and their respective GHG emission trajectories.

The pessimistic one assumes that the country’s primary aluminium production would drop from 1,44Mt in 2011 to 900kt in 2012-2013, 740kt in 2014-2015 and 660kt from 2016.

The optimistic one considers that the output would grow from 1,44Mt in 2011 to 2,72M t in 2025, implying a 4.63% CAGR. Unfortunately, the authors have not delivered a base-scenario.

Even under the optimistic scenario, which seems to be non-realistic under the current circumstances, the total amount of GHG emissions generated by the aluminium companies would reach roughly 9Mt CO 2 equivalent; a little lower than the target determined by the Brazilian government in the “Industry Plan”.

Based again on the two production scenarios, FGV simulated four possibilities about the fuel composition to produce alumina: a) 100% fuel oil; b) 50% fuel oil

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Potential investigated mitigation measures

Degree of potential change

Effort made in Brazil

Alternative technologies for the production of alumina

Very high

Null

Alternative technological routes for the production of primary aluminium

Very high

Null

Type of process used in the production of primary aluminium

High

Medium

Alternative sources of thermal energy

High

Null

Efficient use of thermal energy in the production of alumina

High

Without information

Medium/high

Medium/high

Recycling aluminium Reduction technologies and monitoring of the anode effect

Medium

High

Isolated generation of renewable energy

Medium

Medium/high

Bauxite’s quality

Low

High

Other electrical efficiency measures in phase reduction

Low

Medium/high

Table 2 Potential investigated mitigation measures in the world aluminium industry for reducing GHG emissions and respective effort made in Brazil. Source: Getúlio Vagas Foundation (2013)

and 50% liquefied gas oil; c) 50% fuel oil and 50% of natural gas; d) 50% fuel oil and 50% charcoal. The best option was the latter , which would result in 10% improvement comparatively to the worst one (100% fuel oil) in the optimistic scenario.

Finally, the authors also discussed the potential possibilities of the reduction of GHG emissions in the world aluminium industry and the present effort around these factors in Brazil ( Table 2 ).

Regrettably, for the two opportunities

with the highest prospective impacts (alternative technologies for the production of alumina and primary aluminium) globally , there is not any relevant work carried out by the Brazilian companies and academia.

Both technologies demand a large amount of investment and considerable R&D effort, which seems to be beyond the financial and organisational capabilities of the country’s enterprises. Thus, they tend to be followers of the techniques employed abroad. ᔢ

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Aluminium International Today

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18 CHINA UPDATE

Power prices and China’s aluminium industry

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During the first half of 2013, the global supply of aluminium has stayed in surplus and most aluminium companies suffered from increasing financial pressure. Yet, China’s domestic aluminium chain, especially electrolytic aluminium, has been released from great pressure due to the lowering of power prices. By Lili Shi* The expanding losses in the domestic aluminium industry have caused worry .

Based on the statistics of China’s National M etals Industry Association in 2012, 89 aluminium smelters out of 281 suffered from losses and the loss percentage came to 31.7%, while the loss volume came to 11.35 billion yuan or 1.86 billion US dollars.

Therefore, the Ministry of Industry and Information T echnology released: “Regulations as to the Entrance to Aluminium Industry,” at the end of July this year, in which it made revisions for the same regulations in 2007 and more strict legislation for the entrance of electrolytic aluminium projects and encouraged relevant enterprises to realise the combination of water -electricityaluminium, coal-electricity -aluminium or electricity-aluminium.

At present, the average price for electrolytic aluminium in China is around 14700 yuan or 2409 US dollars and the major costs come from electricity and primary aluminium. There is not much difference in the prices for primary aluminium in different regions, which stay around 5000 yuan or 819 US dollars. But the costs for power differ a lot in these places due to the distribution of coal resources.

“Power costs in certain regions, such as Henan, and Shandong, are pretty high and account for almost 50% of the total; while some parts such as Xinjiang, Northwest, take over 20 – 40% of the total,” said a spokesperson for Guotai Junan Futures, a Chinese-based brokerage for commodity and financial futures, which explained why the aluminium capacity in Xinjiang region has expanded so fast.

Power consumption for China’s electrolytic aluminium each year accounts for around 5% of the total consumption in China and it is mainly divided as supply by power network and self-supply power. The cost for the self -supply power resources only stays around 0.2 - 0.3 yuan (or 0.04 US dollars)/kw-hr, while the cost for supply

by power network will double. “Those with self supply power and thermal power take over 30 - 40% of the total aluminium enterprises,” added Guotai Junan Futures.

“Power cost is a key factor to decide the competitiveness of electrolytic aluminium enterprises and the combination of coalpower-aluminium has become the common view for the aluminium industry,” said a market participant. A small majority of electrolytic aluminium companies therefore began to focus on the upstream areas of coal and electricity . CHINALCO made the first strategic step to lower production costs and purchased Ningxia Power Group in February 2013.

Yet some might worry that the combination of coal-power -aluminium might put pressure on the finance of aluminium companies.

Chinese aluminium enterprises poured to Xinjiang to set up plants and those with power plants of their own can save up to 60% compared with their counterparts in Shandong and Henan. Along with rising electricity prices and power usage restrictions, electrolytic aluminium companies in the Eastern regions have been struggling. Yet the Xinjiang area has rich coal resources and the self provided electricity is 60% cheaper than Henan, Shandong, etc. Therefore, it has gradually become the new land for aluminium investment.

But the aluminium companies in Western regions like Xinjiang have their own concerns: “The moving W est of capacities might aggravate the overly surplus, which will give constant blows to electrolytic aluminium prices.” The power costs for tonnage aluminium in Xinjiang could be 4200 yuan or 688 US dollars cheaper than the inland regions.

Although certain enterprises in Henan and Shandong have gradually moved to Western regions like Xinjiang and Qinghai under the huge lust of cheaper power cost, this process still encountered certain problems.

“From the point of trading, shipment is

a major issue that should be considered.

We would prefer to take the materials that are adjacent to the destination. So we seldom buy from Xinjiang, unless there are trucks that can carry aluminium to the warehouses, since traders shall never consider the shipment themselves. Plus, the shipment becomes more inconvenient to Xinjiang and inner Mongolia when the weather gets colder,” said a trader from Shandong.

Ladder power price

It is learned from China’s Nonferrous Metals Industry Association (CNIA) that the ladder-type power price for electrolytic aluminium is still at an early stage. But it will not be long before the government formally approves this system. The major aim of such a system is to mitigate the overly surplus supply of China’s aluminium production capacity and the government will see if it is going to be feasible in typical enterprises so that a scientific pricing manner could be worked out.

Based on the CNIA , China’s Development and Reform Commission is making such a system, although the exact timetable has not been designated. China’s State Council released the guidelines on 15th October 2013 to mitigate the surplus and the government will carry out differential and punishing power prices for those aluminium enterprises that go over the energy consuming standards and do not abide with environmental rules.

“Once such a system gets formally carried out, it will have a certain influence on the overall aluminium industry ,” commented an industrial player . The socalled ladder electricity prices are meant to kick non-environmentally friendly and high-energy consuming enterprises out of the market.

Power cost, as the major cost for electrolytic aluminium players, account for around 45% of the total production cost.

So if they have means to reduce such costs, it will be their major competitiveness. ᔢ

*Consultant January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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20 RUSSIA UPDATE

www.aluminiumtoday.com Pot Room at Rusal’s Khakas smelter

Creating value through R&D An uncertain outlook coupled with the volatile economic environment demands a flexible and collaborative approach to innovation. UC Rusal is revising its R&D strategies to promote operational efficiencies in a time of limited resources. By Victor Mann* Rusal has shifted its R&D strategy to adjust to the present market climate.

Ongoing R&D projects help the company to address the key operating and financial issues in a challenging austere environment. These can be gathered in four major groups: - Environmental projects - Management of smelters’ capacities - Reduction of production costs - Increasing VAP output Environmental perspective

The importance of environmental issues grows dramatically year-on-year. European countries are dropping old, outdated and traditional forms of energy in favour of greener and environmentally sustainable methods, while emerging Asian economies are trying to catch up with the W est by putting greater emphasis on lowering CO2 emissions.

Environmental projects launched by Rusal are aimed at reducing its ecological footprint with minimal capex. Upgrading to EcoSoederberg technology is a major initiative. Over USD $35 million has been invested in the research programme and pilot areas since 2005. Ultimately, this will enable the company to reach the ecological standards that are to close the baked anodes-based production standards at lower costs. The technology is to be deployed at Rusal’s two largest aluminium

smelters: Krasnoyarsk Aluminium Smelter (KrAZ) and Bratsk Aluminium Smelter (BrAZ) in 2014. The project is expected to take up to four and a half years to be completed.

With respect to its Alumina division, as part of an R&D project to develop a technology for processing red mud, construction of a new area has begun at Ural Aluminium Smelter (UAZ) to produce a product with low alkaline content, so it can be used in ferrous metals and cement production. In a large-scale laboratory project, a new production process was developed and tested for using red mud to make iron ore concentrate (Fe ~ 50%) and scandium oxide (over 99% purity). In 2013 semi-industrial trials of the products made from red mud were carried out on customers’ premises and it was confirmed that more are interested in conducting further industrial trials like this.

Rusal is also working to mitigate the potential negative impact of production waste on the environment. On a worldwide basis, the aluminium industry is continuing to research methods and processes to re-use or treat spent pot lining (SPL) material prior to disposal or landfill – and solutions are beginning to emerge.

The technology it is now developing is designed to cut the SPL volumes sent to landfills by 25% and the costs attributed to mounting cathode linings by 10-15%.

On the one hand, it is rising environmental standards that cause the company to run this project and switch to resource efficient technologies; while on the other hand it wasn't until a few years ago that a new material emerged (partially carbonised lignite) that will help it to introduce this technique at its industrial facilities.

Production discipline

When there’s an urgent need for a disciplined and balanced approach in the global aluminium industry it is critical to come up with the technological solutions that will enable enterprises to manage production levels by adjusting them depending on the market climate.

Therefore it is essential that the industry meet the actual demand rather than running in full-swing production mode.

With this in mind, the company is focusing on the reduction of amperage and flexible re-launch of pots.

Cutting costs

In the aluminium division, the company's focus remains on reducing energy consumption, through improvements that involve cathodes and anodes-based technology. F or example, it is aiming to reduce anode drop-ins and to improve cells control. Furthermore, the company is seeking to bring down raw material costs by raising calcining furnace capacity level

*Rusal R&D Director January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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RUSSIA UPDATE 21

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to rely on the in-house production. Rusal also intends to switch from coal tar pitch to alternative pitch as the Russian aluminium industry remains short of the former. The ongoing project to build a 870,000 tonne per year carbon plant in Taishet will help to ensure continuous anodes supplies to its smelters.

In the alumina division, the same strategic goal is to be achieved by reducing consumption of the thermal energy and caustic and switching refineries to low-cost energy (from fuel oil to gas and from hardcoal to lignite) and to cheaper bauxite inputs.

More value through innovation

A crisis always provides an opportunity to introduce greater efficiency and innovation. This is the reason why Rusal has been focusing on higher margin upstream business by increasing the production of value added products (VAP).

Firstly, the company continues to develop new alloy production technologies and solutions to improve the physical and mechanical properties of its goods, i.e. strength and conductivity on the one hand, and to extend its product range.

One of the examples is Al-Zr (aluminum-

Aluminium International Today

Inert anode developed by Rusal

zirconium) alloy for wire rod (electricalgrade) and other products and Al–REM (REM – Rare-Earth M etals, including Scandium) alloys for wire used in household construction and other production.

Secondly, its increasing VAP production capacity. In 2012, Rusal carried out eight major projects of that kind. Last year value added products accounted for 39% of total primary aluminium production, or 1,616 kt; this share is expected to reach 55% in 2016. Since 2013, six projects relating to production of slabs, billets and wire rod have been carried out with a total budget of USD $107.8 million.

Way forward

The use of inert anodes in the aluminium smelting process has the potential to bring an industry -wide revolution. Once

introduced, the technology will enable Rusal to eliminate any greenhouse gas and polyaromatic hydrocarbon emissions, ensuring more than a 10% cut in operational costs through reducing anode and energy consumption and a cut of more than 30% in Greenfield projects expenditure costs.

The R&D team has developed an inert anode to produce 99.5% purity aluminium. The technology has come through rig testing (in the inert anode 3,000 amp pilot prototype cell) and is now being tested at the production site. The new design of the inert anode cell is expected to be produced in 2014, installed and tested at KrAZ starting from 2015.

The company is also developing a new technology of alumina production from low grade ores, including Siberian aluminous clays to reduce transportation costs of alumina at the gate of Siberian smelters. The technology has been tested at lab scale and confirmed required alumina quality for use in smelters.

Rusal is improving day-to-day operations and taking austerity measures, however , ultimately, it is technology that is the driving force of the business and the key to further economic growth. ᔢ

January/February 2014

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22 MIDDLE EAST UPDATE

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ARABAL highlights need for SMEs The 17th Arab International Aluminium Conference (ARABAL) was held at the beautiful St Regis Hotel in Abu Dhabi on 5th – 7th November 2013. Nadine Firth* was in attendance.

The theme for ARABAL 2013 was “Together, driving the aluminium industry forward,” with the focus on how the industry in the GCC region has brought jobs, diversification and opportunities, as well as contributing to GDP at national and regional level.

The development of innovative reduction technology across the U AE has further raised the profile of the region, especially in terms of greater operating efficiency and reduced environmental impact.

Anniversary

ARABAL is the premier trade event for the M iddle East’s aluminium industry . The story began in 1983 with K uwait Aluminium Co. bringing together the leading figures in Middle East Aluminium to strengthen ties and discuss the issues of the day.

This year, the conference was held by Emal and delegates were treated to a number of accompanying events including a Gala Dinner at the sumptuous M onte Carlo Beach Club, Abu Dhabi.

Event

Around 585 delegates attended the threeday event, which opened with a preconference workshop detailing how Dubal’s proprietary DX+ Technology builds upon the strength and success of its earlier DX Technology, offering smelters greater operating efficiencies at lower capital costs.

This was followed by a site tour of the Emal smelter. M ore than 100 delegates were taken on a drive by tour of phase I and the newly opened phase II, the power plant, reduction facilities, central maintenance services and the port area with a special stop off at Emal’s casthouse for a conversation with employees.

Conference

A common topic ran through the opening speeches of the ARABAL 2013 conference: The need for more small and medium enterprises (SMEs) within GCC states and for greater integration amongst all Arab countries. This was highlighted by H.E. Eng. Mohammed Ahmed Bin Abdul Aziz Al Shihhi, Undersecretary of the U AE Ministry of Economy, Mohammed Al Naki, Chairman of ARABAL and Saeed Fadhel Al Mazrooei, Chief Executive Officer for Emal.

“With the availability of primary producers in the region, there is a great opportunity for small and medium enterprises to set up and contribute final products,” said Al Shihhi. He went on to call for greater integration and unified legislation within the GCC to incubate and support SMEs. Al Naki noted that in 2012 the Arab world accounted for 7.8% of the total global aluminium production and that the figure was expected to rise to 10% by 2020 as expansion and greenfield projects come on-stream.

According to Al Mazrooei, the growth of smelting and the resulting downstream sector in the U AE has been one of the most important strategic investments to economic growth in the country.

Sessions

A total of six sessions across two days covered all areas of the aluminium industry, beginning with a look at the investment and future opportunities of the GCC smelters.

Build now and reap the benefits later or take a conservative outlook on expansion?

That was the question tackled by the discussion panel on opportunities, investments and future planning.

Panellists included Y ousuf Bastaki, vice * Editor, Aluminium International Today

president, projects, Emal and Dubal; Khalid Al-Luhaidan, vice president, Aluminium SBU, Ma’aden; Said Al Masoudi, CEO, Sohar Aluminium; and Tim Murray, CEO, Alba.

Outlooks differed considerably based on each panellist’s view on markets like China.

While the current high inventories are driving prices and profitability down, some of the panel believed that market demand will continue to grow over the next three years as smelters complete expansion projects – leaving them well placed to reap the rewards of investing when others aren’t.

Warehousing

In recent years, there has been a growing call to review the London Metal Exchange’s (LM E) warehousing rules. At this year’s event, experts on the subject discussed the possible outcomes and the impact they could have on primary aluminium producers.

Long wait times and inflated prices remained at the centre of a spirited debate as panellists exchanged divergent viewpoints on LME reforms and plans to solve the warehousing crisis. In an engaging discussion on premiums being driven up by competition from warehouses, Nick M adden, senior vice president and chief supply officer for Novelis and David Wilson, director, metals research and strategy, Citi Research, had a split of opinion on whether “the US consumer overpays for the metal to the tune of USD3 billion a year.” An audience poll conducted during the session revealed that a vast majority of the audience expects the spot aluminium premium to be trading between USD150 – 200 a tonne in 12 months’ time.

Aluminium pricing outlook

Demographic trends bode well for

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23

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aluminium in the longer -term as the metal has one of the highest rates of demand growth among the industrial metals. The final session on the first day opened with presentations on short-term drivers for aluminium price and China’s impact on the global aluminium market.

Expert sector analysts shared best available aluminium market analysis and price views to aluminium buyers and sellers. In light of the extreme volatility experienced in the metal space, a lively panel discussion that followed explored the cyclical nature of the industry and the impact of China’s dramatic growth in production capacity of primary aluminium on the world market.

seeking out new revenue streams and some noted that this regional market might be the next important step in the region’s aluminium sector growth.

Downstream attention

Environmental drivers

The fifth session saw the attention turn towards casthouse product mix and downstream initiatives in the MENA. In the UAE, economic viability is secured by focusing on value added or made to order products. The focus on extrusion billets and foundry alloys at the U AE’s two primary smelters has given them flexibility to meet market demand and retain customers.

However, as some of the panel pointed out, more needs to be done. Recycling is not just about sustainability , but about

Aluminium International Today

The final session on day two focused on the initiatives undertaken by Abu Dhabi and the GCC to address renewable energy and sustainability issues in order to set a benchmark that will ultimately support sustainable development throughout the region, as well as provide a functioning blueprint for sustainable living worldwide.

In this closing session, speakers discussed the investments in energy efficient systems and showcased inspiring models of environmental excellence adopted by smelters in the region.

Exhibition

The conference was accompanied by the largest ARABAL exhibition to date, with nearly 40 stands. W ith more that 100 exhibitors in attendance, the exhibition was a hub of activity during conference breaks.

The exhibition space consisted of a GCC Pavillion representing ARABAL Committee members, five media partner stands, including Aluminium International Today, as well as 26 companies from across the aluminium industry.

Next year

The 18th edition of ARABAL will be hosted

by Alba in 2014. Visit the events page on www.aluminiumtoday.com for further information. ᔢ

January/February 2014

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24 RECYCLING

www.aluminiumtoday.com

Aluminium recycling is on a roll With the words ‘reuse, reduce, recycle’ now commonplace across the aluminium industry, Novelis, a specialist in rolled products and recycling, is committed to reaching an 80% recycled metal input goal by 2020. Nadine Firth* spoke with Marco Palmieri, senior vice president and president of Novelis North America, about the current state of the industry, the products driving demand and the plans in place for the company to reach its goal.

Marco Palmieri, senior vice president, Novelis North America

Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, Novelis operates 25 manufacturing facilities in nine countries on four continents, with nearly 11,000 employees. The company reported revenue of $9.8 billion in the fiscal year (FY) ending 31st March 2013 and is one of the world’s largest rolled aluminium producers in terms of volume shipped, and one of the largest purchasers of aluminium.

The company is also a leader in aluminium recycling – with approximately 40 billion beverage cans alone recycled through its facilities each year. The recycled aluminium it collects and processes is primarily utilised by its rolling facilities to produce new can sheet and other high recycled content rolled aluminium products.

History

Novelis’ company history represents a combination of new and old. Created in 2005 as a spin-off from aluminium producer Alcan Inc., the company is a young, growth-oriented company backed by a 90-year history in the aluminium rolling business.

It inherited its core rolling assets from Alcan. The first Alcan rolling operation began in 1916 in Toronto, Ontario, with an 84-inch hot mill and three finishing mills.

Over the years, Alcan constructed a number of mills, including several that are among the largest aluminium rolling operations in each of the geographic regions in which Novelis operates:

Bales of crushed aluminum cans at Novelis’ recycling plant in Berea, Kty

Oswego, USA , Norf , Germany , and Pindamonhangaba, Brazil.

M ore recent expansions were made through both acquisitions and modernisation of existing mills, which increased Alcan’s capabilities and capacity.

Alcan spun off Novelis as an independent entity to carry on most of the aluminium rolled products businesses.

Personal profile

M arco P almieri has more than 30 years experience in the aluminium industry and his roles have seen him involved across all areas of the aluminium production process.

Originally from Brazil, M arco began serving as president of Novelis South America in 2011, where he oversaw four facilities employing 1,760 people and generating $1.4 billion in FY13 sales. In May 2013, he was instated as president of Novelis North America, a region with nearly double (3,120) the employees in 11 facilities and acquiring $3.4 billion in sales for FY13.

“When I was 11 or 12, I remember I went to my Mother and F ather and told them that I wanted to become an engineer – I don’t think they believed me! I also told them that I wanted to go and study at the School of Mines in Ouro Preto, Brazil (one of the best in the country for Geology).

They finally realised I was serious about it when I got my Degree in metallurgy and I’m here now after a number of years,” he says.

Changes

During his time in the industry, Marco has witnessed many changes: “One of the most notable events that I witnessed was when Russia flooded the market with metal in the 1980s,” he explains. “That was a major crisis for the aluminium industry. The price went down and the governments came together to work to compensate for it, which brought a lot of changes to the industry.”

Today he notes that another major change is the introduction of China as a major industry player. “China has become the number one producer and consumer of aluminium in the world – this has also brought quite a different dynamic to the market.”

A shift in the geographical locations of primary aluminium production has also been one of the biggest changes Marco has seen during his career. “The change in the use of aluminium in different areas is also of significance,” he says. “In the aircraft industry for example, a lot of light alloys are being used more and more, while developments in automotives has also seen more aluminium being used.”

Downstream growth

When examining the current state of the aluminium industry today , M arco breaks the industry down into ‘upstream and downstream’. “The primary aluminium industry is currently suffering due to the price of aluminium being low and there is a major surplus in the market,” he says.

*Editor, Aluminium International Today January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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RECYCLING 25

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“However, for the downstream market it is a different story and this is where Novelis comes in,” he continues. “W e work across the can, automotive, and speciality markets and there are good opportunities there for all three of them.”

In particular, the automotive industry is projected to grow 30% percent year over year. “We have a very big position in the automotive industry and this projected growth is very positive for us,” says Marco.

Novelis is also one of the leaders in supplying aluminium cans and this is another market that is projected to grow at a rate of 4-5% each year across the world.

“We see continued future growth for Novelis and the company is in the process of finishing a major investment programme – more than 1 billion dollars in the past three years – growing our capacities in South America, Asia, Europe, North America,” highlights Marco.

Innovation

According to M arco, “the name of the game is innovation,” and it seems that

one way that Novelis is leading the way in innovation is through lightweighting.

“Even if you look at an aluminium can, the amount of technology behind it is huge. People don’t realise that!”

Over the past few years, the weight of an aluminium can has been reduced by more than 30-40% and there are continued research and development (R&D) programmes in place to see a further reduction in weight.

material for beverage cans.

M ade of a minimum 90% recycled aluminium, evercan can body sheet is certified by Scientific Certification Services (SCS), an independent leader in environmental auditing.

Proving that used beverage cans are a valuable resource, evercan sheet closes the loop between consumer recycling and producing new cans. Recycling aluminium also saves energy and reduces emissions.

Aluminium cans

Sustainability goal

Marco has some work to do during the interview to highlight the benefits of aluminium as a packaging material, but he succeeds in taking my mind off glass and I feel I am easily swayed.

“I think the aluminium can is recognised all over the world. It’s the packaging that is almost unbeatable – it is lightweight, 100% recyclable and it protects the food or drink inside it,” he says.

The company has recently introduced the ‘evercan’ can body sheet; the world’s first certified high-recycled content

The company is currently in the process of shifting its business model from a traditional linear model to a closed-loop model. This has lead to it setting the goal of 80% recycled metal input by 2020.

“We are aware that achieving this goal will require a lot of work, new technology and investments, but all elements are in place and we are on track.”

For the FY 2013, Novelis achieved 43% recycled inputs, up from 33% two years earlier and Marco highlights that through innovation and introducing “new technology to process aluminium scraps that are not processed today ,” the company will reach its goal by 2020, or possibly even earlier.

Future

“From Novelis’ point of view I am extremely positive,” concludes M arco.

“There are a few issues to be resolved for the upstream industry , but growth is continuing for the downstream market and I am confident that aluminium will be around for many, many years to come.” ᔢ Contact www.novelis.com

Rolling aluminum on the hot mill at Oswego, NY

Aluminium International Today

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This article provides a background on sustainability in the mining and minerals industry, including Bauxite & Alumina (Bx & Aa), and explores relationships between sustainability and quality criteria for Bx deposits, respectively design criteria for Aa refineries.

By Peter-Hans ter Weer*

Sustainability aspects of bauxite deposits and alumina refineries Sustainable Development: “People, Planet, Profit, Governance”

The Global Mining Initiative (GMI) led by companies making up the mining and minerals working group of the W orld Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) commissioned the independent M ining, M inerals and Sustainable Development (MMSD) project, conducted by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED).

In the Executive Summary of the 2002 M M SD report it is stated: “One of the greatest challenges facing the world today is integrating economic activity with environmental integrity, social concerns, and effective governance systems. The goal of that integration can be seen as ‘sustainable development’. In the context of the minerals sector, the goal should be to maximise the contribution to the wellbeing of the current generation in a way that ensures an equitable distribution of its costs and benefits, without reducing the

potential for future generations to meet their own needs”.

In other words the four dimensions of Sustainable Development (SD) comprise: • Social sphere often referred to as “People” aspect.

• Environment (“Planet”).

• Economics (“Profit”).

• Governance sphere providing the backdrop for the other three (the three “pillars” of SD).

implement: 1. Commitments: 10 principles for SD, based on the issues identified in the M M SD project; 2. Public reporting: Performance reporting against the 10 principles in accordance with the guidelines of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI); and 3. Independent assurance: Providing third-party verification against five aspects that a company is meeting its commitments to the 10 principles.

This builds on the most widely accepted definition of SD by the 1987 Brundtland Commission on Environment and Development: “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. (Fig 1) The International Council on Mining and M etals (ICM M ) developed the SD Framework comprising three elements which member companies are required to

Sustainability reporting guidelines

ICMM* (international Council on Mining & Metals)

Sustainable development framework

1

10 (Sustainable development ) Principles, underpinned by 46 elements

2

Public reporting in the line with GRI (Global reporting initiative) Sustainable reporting framework against MMSS (Mining and metals sector supplement)

3

Independent assurance against 5 aspects

Foundations in the

MMSD

projet

(Mining, Minerals and Sustainable Development Independent 2-year project (2000-2002) Commissioned by

Conducted by

Fig 1 illustrates the connections between the councils, committees and sustainability aspects discussed

GMI

IIED

(Global Mining Initiative

(International Institute for Environment & Development)

Led by companies that made up mining & mineral working group of * set up by GMI to replace existing Int Council on Metals and the Environment

WBCSD

(World Business Council for Sustainable Development)

Fig 1 Sustainability organisations and connections

GRI’s Reporting Guidelines are the generally accepted framework for reporting on an organisation’s economic, environmental, and social performance, and are used by many Al industry majors as standard for sustainability reporting. ICMM members are committed to reporting against the Mining and Metals Sector Supplement (MMSS). The mining and metals sector includes exploration, mining and primary metal processing (refining, smelting, recycling and basic fabrication) and covers the complete project life cycle from development through operational lifetime to closure and postclosure. The Guidelines comprise (Fig 2): Part 1 - Reporting Principles with three main elements: Defining Report Content; Reporting Principles for Defining Quality; and Reporting Guidance for Boundary Setting.

Part 2 - Standard Disclosures specifying base content that should appear in a sustainability report with disclosures on: Strategy and Profile; M anagement Approach; and P erformance Indicators providing comparable information on the economic, environmental, and social performance of the organisation.

* TWS Services and Advice, The Netherlands Aluminium International Today

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28 MINING & REFINING

Reporting principles defining quality Defining report Part 1 content Reporting principles Global Guidance boundary reporting setting initiative

www.aluminiumtoday.com

Strategy and profile

Human rights Labour practices & decent work

Part 2 Standard disclosures

Economic (profit)

Social (people)

Indirect economic impacts

Product responsibility

Sustainable Bx&Aa refinery Product project Compliance Transport

Materials

Management approach

Environmental (planet)

Performance indicators Energy

Fig 2 Global reporting initiative overview

Water

Emissions effluents, waste

Biodiversity

Fig 3 shows GRI sustainability performance indicators broken down into major subindicators for a Bx & Aa project

Bauxite deposit quality criterion

Target

Related GRI performance indicator Economic Environmental

1. Country infrastructure Capex 1

Market presence

Economic performance

Society

Social

250 US$/Annual tA capacity max

EC1, EC4 EC8, EC9

Rail (+ other): 150km max

EC1

EN4, EN29

0.35m2/tA max2,8

EC1

EN12-MM1, EN14

SO1, (SO1-MM9)

4A material mined 3

3.4 t/tA max (dry basis) 3,8

EC1

EN1, EN21, EN22-MM3

SO1, (SO1-MM9)

4B residue to disposal 4

1.2t/tA max (dry basis) 4,8

EC1

EN4, EN12-MM1, EN21, EN22-MM3 EN3, EN16, EN20

2. Distance resource - port

LA1, SO1, SO1-MM9

Bx slurry pumping: 100km min 3. Disturbed acreage per tA produced 2 4. Material handled per tA produced, split over

5. Alumina in boehmite

2% max

EC1

75kg/tA max5,8 (100% NaOH basis)

EC1

EN1, EN4

7. Ratio % extractable organic carbon/% available Al 2O3

0.002 max6,8

EC1

EN3, EN21, EN22, EN22-MM3

8. Resource contained alumina

30 years min 7

EC1

6. Total caustic consumption per tA produced 5

SO1, (SO1-MM9), SO1-MM10

1. Capex for railway, housing, roads, resettlement, and non-refinery related port items (eg jetty , power supply). 2. At in-situ bauxite SG=1.85 and mining recovery=90%. 3. Includes overburden and bauxite beneficiation tailings (if applicable), at mining recovery=90%. 4. Bauxite residue to disposal, incl sand and lime products. 5. Incl chemical soda loss (reactive SiO 2), physical soda losses (bauxite residue), and other losses (eg oxalate, product, etc). 6. Assuming an extraction efficiency of about 50%, this means effectively a ratio of %TOC/%avail. Aa of ~0.004 (TOC= total organiccarbon). 7. E.g. for a 1Mt/y alumina refinery project: 30Mt contained alumina, or in situ bauxite about 30x3=90Mt. 8. First quartile/median of global bauxite mines excl China.

Table 1 Bauxite deposit quality criteria & their sustainability facets

The sections on Management Approach and Performance Indicators are organised by the categories Social, Environmental, and Economic, with Disclosures covering the following aspects (Fig 3): • Social: Labour Practices; Human Rights; Society; and Product Responsibility.

• Environmental: Materials; Energy; Water; Biodiversity; Emissions, effluents, and waste; Transport; Products and Services; and Compliance.

• Economic: Economic performance; M arket presence; and Indirect economic impacts.

SD Goals

The March 2013 joint UN Global Compact – WB CSD report included inputs by business leaders w.r.t. scope and nature of SD Goals. These should: 1.

Reflect the 3 pillars of SD; 2. Include a dimension related to equitable economic growth; 3. Adequately address water , energy, food, and the effective management and maintenance of ecosystems services; and 4. Appropriate January/February 2014

timeframe is 15 years, with five-year reviews involving all stakeholders.

The Responsible Aluminium Scoping Phase (RASP) was a response from a working group of industry -based organisations and non-profit stakeholders to a demand for products produced to the best social and ecological standards throughout the supply chain.

Their report included a preliminary list of identified issues for the upstream part of Al the value chain (includes Bx mining & Aa refining): • BxM ining: W aste and Noise Management; Dust Emissions.

• Aa Refining: Bx Residue and Caustic Soda M anagement; SO 2 and NO x emissions.

• Al Upstream: Land Use and Biodiversity; Energy efficiency; CO 2 emissions; Social Displacement and Resettlement.

• Al V alue Chain: T ransparency and Business Ethics; Human and Labour Rights; Water M anagement; Health and Safety; Transport and Corridor M anagement; Sustainability of Communities.

Building on the work done, the Aluminium Stewardship Initiative (ASI) was launched in 2012 to enhance sustainability and transparency throughout the Al industry, aiming to develop a global standard for Al sustainability by the end of 2014, to foster responsible resource management of Al through its entire value chain.

Corporate strategic sustainability targets

The long term (LT)/strategic sustainability targets published by industry majors (Alcoa, Rusal, Rio Tinto, Hydro, BHP Billiton) are in broad terms in line with the SD goals discussed above: Social: 1. Zero fatalities; 2. Increase diversity (w.r.t. representation by women, minorities, locals in management, etc); 3A. Zero significant community incidents; 3B. Funds and activities targeted for community assistance programs and sometimes infrastructure (e.g. medical clinics).

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30 MINING & REFINING

Refinery design criterion

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Target/benchmark

Economic

Related GRI performance indicator Environmental

Social

90+kg/m3

EC1

EN1, EN3, EN4, EN16, EN22-MM3

PR1

2. Digestion temperature

Refer Table 1, item 5

EC1

EN3, EN16, EN20

3. Digestion technology

Slurry heating (“single streaming”) EC1

EN1, EN8, EN12-MM1, EN21, EN22-MM3

1. Precipitation liquor yield

4. Bx residue settling & washing technology 5. Heat interchange technology 6. Precipitation technology

As 1 (precipitation liquor yield)

High rate thickening/washing Direct heat transfer

SO1, SO1-MM9, SO1-MM10

As 1

High solids tanks; seed filtration; interstage cooking; green liquor split;

As 1

Split seeding; classification by hydrocyclones 7. Power & steam generation

Use of gas as energy carrier

EC1

EN1, EN3, EN16

Refer also Table 1, item 5

EC1

EN3, EN16, EN20 EN16, EN20

SO1

EC1

EN1, EN3, EN16, EN20

PR1

EC1

EN4, EN12-MM1, EN21, EN22-MM3

Off-gas de-sulphurisation 8. Calcination technology 9. Bauxite residue disposal technology

Stationery calciners

SO1

Dry disposal in areas lined with clay or HDPE/PP seal with underdrains; rehabilitation/re-vegegation afterward;

SO1, (SO1-MM9), SO1-MM10

sea water neutralisation if applicable 10. Overall plant: 10A design & layout

Conventional: design accommodates future digestion/process units New approach: dedicated design and layout for a specified prod, capacity Design for disassembly

10B Production capacity

General: depends on deposit size, plant considerations, economies of scale, infrastructure requirements, and market ecomics, New approach: compact capacity ~300-600ktpa

10C Equipment and additives

Mechanical seal pumps Low-NOx burners (power/steam generation, calciners) Variable speed pump drives Anti-scalling chemicals

10D Control equipment

} } EC1

EN1, EN3, EN4, EN12-MM1

} } EC1

EN1, EN3, EN4, EN12-MM1, EN16, EN22, EN22-MM3

}

EC1

(SO1-MM9), SO1-MM10

EC1, EC4

}

}

LA1, SO1,

}

LA1, SO1, (SO1-MM9), SO1-MM10

EN1, EN3, EN20, EN22

EN1, EN3, EN4, EN16

Table 2 Alumina refinery design criteria & their sustainability facets

Environmental: 1. Reduce Greenhouse GHG or CO 2 emissions; carbon based energy consumption/tA; and fresh water consumption/tA; 2. Improve ratio of new mining disturbance to rehabilitation/reforestation; 3. Alcoa specifies targets for rehab of Bx residue storage areas and recycle/reuse of Bx residue. Hydro has “ambitions to improve existing situation by implementing new dry disposal technology” and “continues to investigate options for Bx residue utilisation”; 4. Biodiversity: Not very specific targets.

Economic: Only some of the majors mention specific economic targets directly as element of their sustainability goals, however all of them refer in their annual report to the need to focus on reducing costs and improving productivity and several refer to specifics such as improving beneficiation and refinery processes, etc.

Impact of Bauxite deposit quality

Basic data normally provided on Bx deposits includes items such as Bx layer thickness, Overburden/Bx ratio, % Available Alumina, Reactive Silica, etc. Although these are important for a resource evaluation, they do not provide a January/February 2014

comprehensive understanding of its strengths and weaknesses. This requires a review of deposit quality in its widest sense, including elements such as strengths and weaknesses w .r.t. energy , water, and materials consumption, and waste (overburden, tailings, etc), project capital and operating costs (capex and opex), and impact on communities, resettlements, etc.

Major resource quality aspects therefore are: Location (country , export port, relocation requirements); Logistics (accessibility of, and logistics to the port via which raw materials are imported and Aa/Bx exported); Accessibility of the deposit relative to the port (distance, river crossings, etc); Deposit characteristics (Overburden and Bx layer thickness, beneficiation requirement, etc); Refinery feed characteristics (% Available Alumina, Boehmite, Reactive Silica, Impurities, etc) – Bx mineralogy and chemical composition influence refinery process conditions and associated raw material consumption and capital requirements; and Resource size (a resource should be able to support a refinery project for its lifetime – typically 40+ years).

Bauxite resource quality in this sense may affect about a third of refinery plant capex

or about half of total project capex if mine and infrastructure capex are included, and has a more profound effect on opex than technology/design. The selected deposit quality criteria should therefore account for the above mentioned elements.

Deposit quality criteria

In summary, a set of Bx deposit quality criteria should be limited to major issues, provide target values, and importantly: Should not be applied rigidly . In other words a resource not meeting one (or perhaps more) target value(s) should not necessarily be excluded, but the overall result should be considered. “Strategic” criteria which could result in a different outcome of a resource review have not been included here (e.g. importance to be present in a country for other reasons than participating in a Bx and Aa project). Table 1 presents a set of quality criteria for Bx deposit review purposes addressing the above elements, and includes references to relevant GRI performance indicators, illustrating the relationship between these quality criteria and sustainability facets.

Conclusions

Table 1 illustrates that quality criteria for the evaluation of a Bx deposit span Aluminium International Today

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economic, environmental and social aspects, the three pillars of SD. In other words sustainability in the context of Bx deposits is not abstract or isolated from “the real world�, but can be qualified and quantified. The table also shows that economic and environmental (in some cases social) aspects are mostly intertwined.

Putting it differently , economically more attractive deposits are often also more attractive in environmental terms.

Several of the criteria of Table 1 are consistent with the issues for the upstream steps of the Al value chain from RASP (e.g. waste management, land use and social resettlement for Bx mining – refer section 0). And all of them are consistent with the LT/strategic corporate sustainability targets of industry majors (refer section 0), implying sustainability’s growing role. It appears therefore reasonable to assume that Bx deposit quality in its widest sense, including sustainability aspects, will play an ever more important role in future development decisions on greenfield Bx and Aa projects.

Refinery design and sustainability

The selection of a Bx deposit for an Aa refining project has a profound effect on the design of the refinery as discussed

above, i.e. the choice of a specific Bx feed influences several important refinery design criteria. However other design criteria are chosen (partly) independent of Bx quality: Process conditions (e.g. plant liquor productivity/yield); Equipment technologies and layout (e.g. for digestion, Bx residue settling, overall plant); Plant location specifics affecting plant design (e.g. rainfall, country legal requirements w .r.t. emission standards); Operating and maintenance philosophies of project owners (e.g. with respect to outsourcing activities, integration of maintenance and operational activities, etc).

Design criteria

It is not possible to cover all refinery design criteria in the context of this article.

However some of the main ones and their sustainability facets are included in Table 2 with references to relevant GRI performance indicators, illustrating the relationship between these criteria and sustainability.

Conclusions

As with the Bx deposit quality criteria, the emerging perspective is that key design criteria of an Aa refinery include the three pillars of SD. Once Bx characterisation test

work has been completed and project size decided, sustainability in the context of refinery design can be qualified and quantified. Table 2 also shows that economic and environmental aspects are most of the time two sides of the same coin, while social aspects are often also integral to refinery design. Put differently optimum refinery design in economic terms is (LT) often also the most attractive environmentally (and sometimes socially).

M ost of the criteria of Table 2 are consistent with the issues for the upstream steps of the Al value chain from RASP (e.g.

Bx residue management; SO 2, CO 2, and NOx emissions; energy efficiency; and caustic soda management for Aa refining.

And most are consistent with the LT/strategic company targets of industry majors. The trend seems that sustainability will play a more prominent role in future decisions on the design of brownfield and greenfield Aa refinery projects. Elements of that trend include: a continuing push to increase plant liquor yield ( Table 2, item 1); finding new approaches and technologies to improve plant and process efficiencies (a.o. item 10) including a growing thrust to improve on Bx residue disposal (item 9); and developing a more sustainable energy supply (item 7).ᔢ

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Aluminium International Today

January/February 2014

hydro_30_AIT_0110 1/10/14 12:15 PM Page 1

PRIMARY 33

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The key to success:

Continuous improvements “The ones that are best at continuously improving their operations will be the winners of our industry,” says Hilde Merete Aasheim*. that we are much better at turning our cutting edge competence into cash now compared to five years back. In total, the improvement measures from the $300 Programme have resulted in an annual improvement effect of NOK 1.4 billion (USD $230 million).”

Looking at the production side, Aasheim says operational and technical parameters have significantly improved, resulting in annual savings of more than NOK 200 million (USD $32 million). “The largest effects are derived from reduced energy and anode consumption, but also increased amperage and current efficiency have resulted in more volume and higher productivity from our assets,” she says.

On logistics, Hydro reported on Capital M arkets Day that the company has reduced annual spending by NOK 250 million (USD $40 million). “Through very disciplined capital focus, we have also reduced spending on sustaining capex by 25% without compromising on the technical integrity of the assets.”

In 2009, Hydro launched its $300 Programme, aimed at improving the cost position of its fully owned primary smelters by $300 per metric ton by the end of 2013. At its Capital M arkets Day for investors and analysts in December , the company announced the completion of the programme, and this article reveals some of the secrets behind its success.

The focus continues

Although the $300 Programme is completed, Aasheim says the job is far from done. “Our improvement efforts can never stop. The drive to continuously find new and smarter ways of operating needs to be part of our organisation’s DNA and a natural part of our everyday lives,” she says.

Hydro operates five fully owned smelters in its portfolio, four of which are located in Norway and the fifth is the K urri K urri smelter in Australia, which was mothballed in 2012. “Had it not been for the $300 Programme, the smelter portfolio in Norway would have struggled with LM E fluctuating at around 1700-1800 dollars per ton,” says Aasheim.

She emphasises that the $300 Programme is not a simple cost-cutting exercise. Rather , she says, its success is based on a structured and systematic approach, engaging the whole organisation in dedicated teams throughout the entire value chain. This approach has also made the company better positioned to deliver more innovative products and solutions to the company’s customers.

Value chain focus

“Through AMPS, our production system, we have been able to improve on a wide range of operational and functional parameters, while at the same time fighting inflation and increasing raw material prices. The economic downturn gave us an extra push to improve, and in that sense, the past few years have actually been good for us.”

The largest operational and technical improvements from Hydro’s programme stem from productivity enhancements.

Hilde Merete Aasheim

Aasheim points out that discovering and eliminating waste from the value chain is one of the key factors that have enabled success.

“You need to keep the focus on what you are able to influence. That means your own operations, and that includes not only what happens in the pot rooms, but also procurement, internal and external logistics, as well as the use of technologic competence to high-grade your product portfolio so that you are able to improve margins above ingot,” says Aasheim.

Leaner operations and support functions

The $300 Programme does not take into account market or currency effects, and is calculated in real terms. Looking at concrete figures, Aasheim can point to improvements across all parts of operations: “Compared to 2009, we now operate at a fixed cost level at the plants which is roughly 10% lower. Above plant level and on technology development, the reduction is 35%, and I would like to add

More programmes to come?

Looking ahead the drive to optimise will stay within the company. “Although most of the low-hanging fruit has been reaped by now , there is still much potential to improve further at our fully owned smelters,” she says, adding that a similar programme for the joint-venture portfolio has been launched where Hydro works with the other partners to support the improvement programmes in the jointventure smelters.

“Each joint-venture has its own specific improvement programme, but in summary, we are aiming to improve the cost position at our six joint-venture smelters by as much as USD $180 per ton by 2016. Although the absolute improvement per ton is lower than on the fully owned smelters, this is a programme which is just as ambitious, given that most of these plants are large scale and very well run assets. But together with our industrial partners, and by capitalising on learning from the $300 Programme, we are confident that we shall deliver also on this by the end of 2016.” ᔢ

*Executive Vice President, Primary Metal, Hydro Aluminium International Today

January/February 2014

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34 PRIMARY

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Kitimat project: Case study As part of the modernisation project at the Kitimat aluminium smelter located in British Columbia, Canada, in March 2012, Rio Tinto Alcan awarded Fives Solios with a contract for a new 42tph Green Anode Plant.

The Kitimat M odernisation Project consisted of upgrading the existing aluminium smelter from Söderberg technology to prebake AP40 technology, in order to increase the aluminium production capacity while meeting stringent environmental regulations.

Fives Solios was in charge of the supply of a Green Anode Plant consisting of a complete paste preparation line including the coke preheating screw, the Intensive M ixing Cascade (IM C) for paste preparation, two Xelios vibrocompacting machines, the anode cooling tunnel as well as the integration of a pitch fume treatment system.

Some specific constraints due to the remote location of Kitimat, including lack of local construction workers specialising in this field and stringent safety requirements, led Fives Solios to consider various options for optimising the total investment cost.

Eventually, the company proposed a total cost effective solution, consisting of designing and delivering the plant on site in five main pre-assembled modules, so that site erection work is limited to final assembly of the modules only.

Selection of the work location

In order to select the potential subcontractors for module fabrication and pre-assembly, several issues were reviewed, such as: • Location of the subcontractor yard with respect to logistics and sea transportation • Taxation • Compliance with Canadian and British Columbia norms and certifications • Cost for fabrication/pre-assembly/ logistics.

January/February 2014

Fives Solios pre-qualified several potential sub-contractors around the world, located in North America, Europe, M alaysia, the Gulf and the Philippines.

Eventually, the risk and cost analysis led to the selection of the Gulf as the best solution.

Fabrication and pre-assembly

All process equipment was manufactured in Europe; several in the workshops of Fives Group subsidiaries: The X elios vibrocompacting machine by Fives Industries, the preheating screw by Fives Stein M anufacturing and the overhead conveyor by Fives Cinetic. To comply with North American regulations, most electrical equipment and materials were sourced from Canada.

A well-established company based in Sharja was selected for the module fabrication and pre-assembly.

The equipment was shipped from Europe to the Gulf for integration into five modules: • Module 1: 275 tons • Module 2: 153 tons • Module 3: 226 tons • Module 4: 191 tons • Module 5: 66 tons

area.

The module transfer by road from the storage yard to the loading terminal started on 14th July with Self Propelled M odular Transportation (SPM T). It took approx 1-hour ½ for each module for the 2km distance.

Taking into account all logistics, port authorisations and hot weather in the Gulf during summer time, the loading of the modules onto the ship lasted almost two weeks. The ship left the Sharja port on 31st July 2013 for a long haul trip of 30 days over the ocean to reach Kitimat in British Columbia, Canada.

Following the supply of a pre-assembled Bath Processing Unit to Alcoa Fjardaal in 2006, the implementation of the modularisation concept on a Green Anode Plant for the Kitimat project demonstrates the capability of Fives Solios to offer and implement fabrication and construction solutions. ᔢ Contact www.fivesgroup.com

The baseframes and lifting beams, to allow the handling and transportation of the modules, were designed by a specialized design office based in Europe before being fabricated in the Gulf.

The ship arrived in Sharja on 14th July 2013. Due to the extra large module size, the port authorities allowed transportation only during night time to avoid any circulation disturbance in the free zone Aluminium International Today

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36 SUSTAINABILITY

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Sustainability schemes Aluminium is increasingly being used as a lighter weight alternative to other metals in vehicles and aircraft. F or ‘short life’ applications like packaging, the indefinite recyclability of aluminium is an advantage.

But the production of aluminium is energy intensive, with the potential for high greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental impacts. How can the industry present the advantages of aluminium to consumers whilst ensuring that production and fabrication are carried out in the most sustainable way?

This question is not unique to aluminium. Plastics and carton/paper are competitors to aluminium in the packaging sector and they are successfully promoting a sustainable message. The timber and wood products sector introduced sustainable forestry practices more than 15 years ago by developing a sustainable production Standard. The plastics packaging industry has recently started a similar process.

Key stakeholders in the aluminium value chain are working on a new approach to sustainability, with the publication of a draft Standard expected early in 2014 (www.aluminium-stewardship.org). This article focuses on what the experience of these other industries can tell us about how this should be implemented for aluminium, to maximise its chances of success.

Lessons learned from other sectors

Competing Sustainability Schemes in a sector are often set-up by different stakeholders. NGO supported schemes normally include outside stakeholder involvement and a certain level of transparency and scrutiny . This can be politically difficult resulting in the development of industry or government led Schemes without these requirements.

Competing schemes result in complexity for suppliers who may be asked by customers to comply with more than one Sustainability Scheme. Although some recognition between Schemes can be negotiated, there are significant advantages to having one, widely accepted Sustainability Scheme from the start.

The key to early and widespread adoption of a Sustainability Scheme is ease of implementation. The aim is to bring all participants to the same minimum level and there is a compromise to be struck on where the bar is set. If it is too high then very few producers will be able to achieve it initially. Some Schemes insist on 100% of the Standard to be achieved from the start.

Others allow a lower level of compliance in the beginning. The implementation of a *Melanie Williams, Sustainability Consultant January/February 2014

By Melanie Williams*

Standard is relatively straightforward, but can be very difficult for others. In the case of aluminium, it will be difficult and expensive for users of conventional electricity in the smelting process to come up to the level of greenhouse gas savings of those already using renewable electricity.

In the early stages of the implementation there will be very little ‘sustainable’ material produced, as most will be ‘business as usual’ material. The Standard needs to cope with this and allow the mixing of the two types of material. Some Standards have put requirements on the material, which can be mixed with ‘sustainable’ material, but this makes the implementation process more difficult.

There are restrictions on mixing material in the timber sector but the food/biofuels sector has not imposed any requirements on this material.

WHAT IS A SUSTAINABILITY SCHEME? A sustainability scheme has at its heart a standard for production of the raw material and its further processing. Principles and criteria encapsulate best practice in production and process covering: Ɂ Water, soil and air quality management; Ɂ Energy saving and minimisation of greenhouse gas emissions; Ɂ Protection of highly bio-diverse areas and high carbon stock land; Ɂ Workers’ rights and safety Ɂ Land rights and legality; Ɂ Local food security; Ɂ Business efficiency; Ɂ Recycling and waste minimisation

Schemes must also decide how ‘sustainable’ material will be traced down the supply chain. This becomes a key consideration for commodities that are widely traded. Some Schemes recognise that it can be too difficult or unnecessary always to trace material down the supply chain, therefore they offer a ‘book and claim’ system. In this system, the proof of sustainability is sold separately from the product. In biofuels and forestry, a formal chain of custody is the norm and proofs of sustainability need to stay with the product, via a mass balance system. The consumer usually has more confidence in the sustainability claims on a product if the material can be traced to a sustainable source. If a mass balance system is adopted, then traders and storage providers need to be involved as well as producers and processors.

Effects on the market

The costs of operating and implementing a Sustainability Scheme need to be considered. Costs associated with

implementation of improvements necessary for compliance will depend on how high the bar is set, and where the operator is placed in relation to it. It is therefore important to understand what sort of price premiums might be generated for sustainable material compared with ‘business as usual’ material. FSC claimed on their website in 2012 ‘Depending on the operation, price premiums for FSC wood, particularly from the tropics, range from 15 to 25%’. Premiums quoted for biofuels are lower than this, typically 5% in 2013 for biodiesel. The cost of operating the Scheme must also be borne, ultimately, by the participating operators. This is usually collected by imposing a small, volume related license fee. An alternative is to levy an annual Scheme membership fee.

There has also been an effect on the way supply chains operate. Final producers or users, who wish to source sustainable material in the early stages of adoption, are more inclined to set up fixed supply chains to supply their needs. This also improves certainty and reduces administrative burdens. The demand for recycled or re-used material is also likely to increase.

Another important question is whether the introduction of a Sustainability Scheme will create extra demand and new uses for the product.

Alternative to a formal Sustainability Scheme?

Companies can ‘go it alone’ and commit to procure only products manufactured or produced according to their own production Standard. Suppliers are audited to ensure that their production is compliant with the Standard. This necessitates introduction of traceability and auditing systems. T o make it practicable a semi-fixed supply chain is required. Implementation requires considerable work but without the wider public recognition that an industry wide Sustainability Scheme offers.

Conclusions

There is enough experience from other sectors to provide lessons for the aluminium industry as it considers the implementation of its own Sustainability Scheme. Encouragingly, increasing uptake and higher prices gained for some sustainable materials both point to a genuine benefit for participating operators.ᔢ Contact www.melaniewilliamsconsulting.com

An extended version of this article is available at www.aluminiumtoday.com Aluminium International Today

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CASTHOUSE - ADVERTORIAL 37

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Quick return on your ROI: optimisation of your casthouse fleet vehicles Primary Aluminium casthouses manage to perform their furnaces charging and maintenance tasks using multifunctional vehicles.

With today’s smelter production capacities, casthouse operations need to be done quickly and efficiently. Countless operations could benefit to be looked at in a different angle.

What if operators could get away, as much as possible, from manual operations? What if almost all casthouse operations could perform with one multifunctional vehicle, rigid or articulated? What if multifunctional vehicles could help to streamline and standardise the process while helping in reducing the maintenance costs? For several years, a Canadian company has been offering a unique concept with extreme versatility. It is called the ‘Mecfor Casthouse solution’, where you can have as many tools as needed that quick connect to a multifunctional vehicle.

Easy, fast and efficient The numbers of dedicated vehicles required for all the furnace tending can be significantly reduced. Multifunctional vehicle with special engineered customised tools can lower the maintenance expenses, lower the operation time and the associated energy loss, thus improving the metal quality and ensuring the safety of the operations. Switching from one tool to another is done in less than 30 seconds.

Mecfor Quick Connect system connects hydraulically onto a variety of modular tools which perform specialised and dedicated tasks such as skimming and cleaning the furnace, scrap charging, alloy material charging and stirring. Tools currently available, but not limited to, are: charging clamps, fork rotators, scrap and skimming tub dumping system, dumping bucket, scrap pusher, scrapers, rakes and skimming tools.

The tools are rigidly held to the vehicle. The hydraulic power on the modular tool opens up a range of possibilities for the development of tools to better fit with today’s cast house realities. The full casthouse cycle can be done by the operator using only one vehicle without leaving the comfort of its air-conditioned cabin. In addition, the cabin is designed in a way that visibility is the key: A full view at all times, especially with the double direction option. Also, it rides gently, thanks to the air-suspension.

Contingency The use of two multifunctional vehicles with a series of detachable tools ensures that all casthouse operations can be carried out by one or the other. This flexibility allows interchanging the tools from one vehicle to another. Reliability engineers, will be pleased to find out that the vehicle utilisation is optimised and that sturdy tools have extra-long shelves life compared to the industry average.

Cost reduction When casthouse operations are carried out more quickly, operating costs decrease and production increases. As production efficiency is based on reducing operating times while maintaining the quality of the cast metal, the availability of optimised tools in the casthouse is essential.

Increased Productivity Smelters using the Quick Connect technology system have enjoyed a quick return on investment, while improving the safety of the workers. Increased productivity goes through a careful selection of the appropriate tools. Significant savings are achieved with the protection of the furnace refractories, the reduced number of vehicles required and the low mechanical maintenance. Safety, productivity, lower costs and ergonomics were the major factors considered in the design of the multifunctional vehicle with an automatic tool Quick Connect system.

Conclusion The goal to increase productivity, to protect the furnace refractory and reduce the number of vehicles can be achieved without compromising on the safety features and ergonomics of the equipment. A number of Primary Aluminium cast houses and rolling mills appreciate working with the multifunctional vehicle and the interchangeable tools. Each tool is designed and adapted to the furnace shapes. Every operation is studied and analyzed taking into account the casthouse layout.

Aluminium International Today

January/February 2014

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EXTRUSION 39

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The Comeback Commodity: Part II

The Global Aluminium Extrusion Outlook for 2014

By Tolga Egrilmezer* When the Norwegian companies Orkla and Hydro merged their aluminium extrusion-related businesses in 2013 to form the new joint venture Sapa AS, they combined hyper -local expertise with a global network and worldwide research and development capabilities.

The joint venture is serving customers in more than 40 countries, with leading positions in Europe and North America, as well as in emerging markets such as Brazil, China, India and Vietnam. Not only were the two companies complementary in terms of geographical footprint, they shared many common values.

The end result has been a coming together of cultures poised to capitalise on growth opportunities in the aluminium extrusion markets around the world.

Worldwide economic overview

A quick glance at today’s economic climate reveals that a slow , steady recovery is occurring in North America, with an increase in the housing market and continued strength in the automotive sector expected.

In Europe, especially Northern Europe, the economic downturn appears to be slowing. And while China’s economy continues to grow – though not at the same pace as in recent years – the country remains a dominant player.

The only dark horse remaining is Southern Europe, where low housing growth and job numbers remain the root cause of a lingering downturn.

Aluminium: The material of the future

For customers, the Sapa joint venture has brought unique capabilities and strengthened service offerings. The company’s new leadership has concentrated on identifying synergies, with the overall goal of growing value and creating the world’s most competitive extrusion organisation. T o do this, Sapa has begun to analyse global demand on a region-by-region level, examining combined resources and deploying strategies accordingly.

Aluminium is the material of the future, and Sapa is convinced that the continued growth of the industry is predicated on new applications and uses of extruded aluminium. The joint venture also highlights industry -leading employee health and safety , good corporate citizenship, and innovation.

Global market specifics

The Freedonia Group’s, World Aluminum M arket study shows that demand for aluminium will grow by 5.8% annually through 2017, bringing it to 82.5 million metric tons.

Though the automotive industry will be a catalyst for growth in the aluminium markets in South America and Asia, the greatest growth in these areas will come from the construction industry.

Throughout North America and Europe, as the economic recovery continues and the housing market regains traction, the aluminium market will see an uptake in the

construction industry. But the biggest gains will be seen in the automotive industry.

Furthermore, in developing countries, rising disposable incomes will lead to a healthy expansion in demand for key aluminium-consuming products, causing the rate of aluminium usage to grow.

North America/Europe

The F reedonia Group predicts that even though North America and Europe will post recoveries from the economic declines of 2007-2012, these developed areas will grow at a significantly slower pace than the world average.

Western Europe will see 2.3% annual growth in aluminium demand through 2017, with Eastern Europe posting 5.2%.

North America will climb at a rate of 3.9%, with growth rates of 3.9% in the United States and 3.7% in Canada and Mexico, respectively. In all of these developed markets, the biggest gains will come from the automotive industry.

Automotive growth is being fueled by car buyers who are demanding an increase in gas mileage. Consequently , auto manufacturers are increasingly turning to aluminium to reduce vehicle weight.

Aluminium use per motor vehicle is expected to rise from a global average of 121 kilograms per vehicle in 2012 to 135 kilograms per vehicle in 2017. M ost developed countries are already above the global average in terms of aluminium weight per vehicle.

As the aluminium market grows, the

*Executive Vice President, Business Development, Sapa AS Aluminium International Today

January/February 2014

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40 EXTRUSION

automotive industry is becoming smarter about using its products, and aluminium extrusions are playing an increasingly critical role. When automakers replace a core steel component with aluminium, they normally don’t switch back.

Aluminium’s light weight, strength and energy-absorbing qualities make the material more cost effective, ultimately giving car -buying customers the competitive gas mileage they want, while at the same time increasing the manufacturer’s bottom line.

In North America, light vehicle sales were on target to reach more than 15 million units by the end of 2013, and that number is expected to continue to rise this year. What’s more, the North American tractor-trailer segment has had a 300% growth increase from 2009, when the average build was at a low of approximately 80,000 units. That number has risen to more than 250,000 units, and is expected to peak in 2014.

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% Annual growth Item

2007

2012

2017

2022

12/07

17/12

World aluminium demand

50220

62180

82500

104900

4.4

5.8

North America

10430

10470

12650

14310

0.1

3.9

United States

8395

8165

9890

11030

-0.6

3.9

Canada & Mexico

2035

2305

2760

3280

2.5

3.7

Western Europe

10660

9520

10680

11600

-2.2

2.3

Asia/Pacific

23510

35390

49930

67180

8.5

7.1

China

13620

23670

35120

48530

11.7

8.2

Japan

4095

4055

4270

4530

-0.2

1.0

Other Asia/Pacific

5795

7665

10540

14120

5.8

6.6

Central & South America

1975

2386

3245

4120

3.9

6.3

Eastern Europe

1936

2178

2800

3415

2.4

5.2

Africa/Mideast

1709

2236

3195

4275

5.5

7.4

Table 1 Summary table - World aluminium demand (thousand metric tons). Source: The Freedonia Group, Inc

South and Central America/Asia and Asia Pacific

The infrastructure and urbanisation booms will lead to significant growth for aluminium in the construction sector in South America, Central America and Asia.

South America, Brazil and Argentina are the aluminium hotspots, according to The Freedonia Group. The demand for the light metal in Argentina is forecast to increase 7.3% each year through 2017. In Brazil, demand is projected to advance 6.9%.

Though Argentina will continue to benefit from domestic building construction spending, the country also will experience impressive growth in domestic motor vehicle production, where numbers will rise from 765,000 units in 2012 to 1.2 million units in 2017.

In addition to an increase in residential building, Brazil will also benefit from the construction activities related to the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympic Games.

Brazil alone is seeing the largest growth in aluminium extrusions, and per -capita data shows that the country January/February 2014

construction-related aluminium demand in China quadrupled in size from 20022012, and is expected to continue to grow, albeit slower, through 2017.

Africa/Middle East

is poised to continue to grow.

Due to rising disposable incomes in the Asia/Pacific region, The Freedonia Group anticipates a rise across the board in key aluminium-consuming products there, with an increase of 7.1% each year through 2017. The exception is Japan, which will grow at only 1% per year.

The Freedonia Group also expects that China, the world’s largest market for aluminium, will increase its share to 43% in 2017.

Because China’s middle-class population is rapidly growing, the country will continue to see the highest aluminium gains in the construction industry. In fact,

The aluminium markets in Africa and the Middle East are expected to increase 7.4% per year through 2017, according to The Freedonia Group’s report. Because energy costs are so important, global primary aluminium production has increasingly shifted to countries with low cost energy supplies in recent years. As a result, countries in the Middle East are showing strong growth in metal production, with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar leading the way.

Shaping the future

The role of aluminium in the world’s economic future remains strong. As more and more countries return to economic health, aluminium demand is expected to grow, and extruded aluminium solutions will be part of that growth. Several sectors, most notably automotive, will play a major role in demand for aluminium extrusions. Sapa AS is ready to meet the growing demand. ᔢ Aluminium International Today

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EXTRUSION 41

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Coated extrusion dies: Company focus “Perfecting your profiles – this claim gets to the heart of both the company’s standards and the advantages for customers: Nothing less than the development and manufacturing of dies for the best possible aluminium profiles.” This is the motto at WEFA in Singen.

Coated extrusion dies According to the company, customers can benefit from using the CVD coated extrusion dies. The surface of these dies is treated using a globally patented CVD process – a chemical gas coating technology.

The price for producing coated dies in this manner is higher than with comparable nitriding tools, but is a worthwhile investment. It provides a long list of advantages that lead to a substantial reduction in total production costs.

Coated extrusion dies (CED) provide longer die life, optimised profile surfaces, faster extrusion speeds – and all of that with a minimum of die correction.

WEFA’s CED-dies can increase the productivity in extrusion factories. The basis for this is the long service life: The bearing channel, protected from wear and tear, guarantees a consistently high form and dimensional stability. In addition, the dies are nearly maintenance-free, due to the fact that no nitriding or repolishing is required. Thus the extrusion process can be carried out with far fewer interruptions.

Without the need for (through) nitriding, the CED-dies make even the finest mandrels and thinnest of tongues possible. And finally , it is possible to work at higher press speeds because of minimal friction and reduced exit temperatures. Thanks to these qualities, the speed and productivity of the extrusion factory can be increased substantially.

WEFA sets new global standards in the area of coated extrusion dies. This requires know-how and technical creativity. F or this reason, the internal development department works in cooperation with renowned technical universities and thus constantly strives to increase the technical knowledge of its staff.

PERFECTING YOUR PROFILES A REAL TREAT: UNIQUELY EFFICIENT EXTRUSION DIE SOLUTIONS FROM THE GLOBAL MARKET LEADER Higher Die lifetime, consistently excellent form and dimensional stability, higher extrusion speed and all of that with a minimum of corrections – the unique coated extrusion dies (CED®) from WEFA bring your productivity up to speed. You can expect a real treat in terms of technology, precision and economy from the global market leader in the coated extrusion dies.

WEFA Singen GmbH Rudolf-Diesel-Str. 11 | 78224 Singen / Germany Phone +49 (0) 7731 . 83 90-0

www.wefa.com

Aluminium International Today

January/February 2014

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TRANSPORT & HANDLING 43

Warehousing and handling issues ˘ solved for Çuhadaroglu ˘ more than 50 years ago and was initially a ˘ was established by Ahmet Çuhadaroglu Çuhadaroglu producer of steel elements. Since 1965 its area of expertise has included architectural and industrial aluminium profiles, curtain wall systems, cladding, doors, and windows. With eight companies now ˘ Group it has grown to be one of the leading concerns of its kind in Turkey. part of the Çuhadaroglu Çuhadaroglu’s ˘ portfolio encompasses prestige projects worldwide including airports, hotels, banks and stadiums. The company also specialises in mill-finish, powder coated and anodised profiles used in the automotive, public vehicle, machine construction and furniture sectors.

The 70,000m 2 production plant in Istanbul accommodates an aluminium casthouse, extrusion lines, extrusion dieshops, perforating and milling facilities and surface treatment units. The sheer volume of mill-finish and finished materials that are moved around and stored on site means that Çuhadaroglu ˘ has to keep a close eye on materials handling to ensure continuous feeding of the production lines, adhere to delivery schedules and avoid bottlenecks.

Investment in equipment for this section of the business is therefore crucial but can often be overlooked – some companies still rely on a mix of ageing fleets of forklift trucks and manual handling, or use forklifts that are not 100% suitable for the task in hand, therefore compromising on operational efficiency as well as safety.

This is not the case at Çuhadaroglu,˘ where effective materials handling methods are regarded as a vital element of the supply and manufacturing process. The company is using a fleet of forklifts from the Irish manufacturer Combilift which, as well as providing streamlined transportation of loads, has solved the issues common to many companies in the aluminium sector – namely how to easily transport and store long and bulky products in a space saving manner. Çuhadaroglu’s ˘ deputy general manager Dr M etin Yilmaz first came across the Combilift range at a trade fair in the USA in 2003 where he also met Combilift’s MD M artin M cVicar. The decision was made Aluminium International Today

that year to purchase an initial second hand model and the successful deployment of this led to steady orders for customised Combilifts over the past 10 years. Çuhadaroglu ˘ now operates nine trucks of varying specifications throughout the plant, which handle around 200 tonnes of material and work an average of 16 hours on a daily basis.

A salient feature of the Combilift range is its four-way ability, enabling the trucks to travel not only forwards and backwards but also sideways when carrying long loads. This eliminates the need for very wide aisles or access doorways and allows for better use of available storage space.

Purchasing managers Onur Bulut and Birol Senturk estimate that space savings of 35% have been achieved compared with the previous system based around conventional counterbalance trucks, which have limited maneuverability.

The Combilift fleet is made up of six C4000 4t capacity trucks, one C3000 3t truck, a heavier duty C5000XL with high ground clearance and a compact counterbalance design Combi-CB model.

All are powered by diesel engines (electric and LPG options are also available) which were the preferred choice due to the long periods that the trucks are in operation, the weight of the loads carried and the distances that the trucks need to travel in the 7,000m 2 undercover and 10,000m 2 outdoor storage areas.

Four of the trucks are used for general handling and loading duties with the other five having designated areas of operation in the casthouse, fabrication and surface treatment units. The ability of all the models to work inside and out and on uneven terrain when required is of particular benefit as this offers a high degree of flexibility across an extensive site,

where perfectly smooth ground conditions cannot be guaranteed in all areas.

The diverse nature of Çuhadaroglu’s ˘ loads – they can weigh from one to four tonnes and come in varying sizes from 1m square pallets to 7m long packs of aluminium - is catered for by the Combilift models that the company uses. The ability to source a mix of machines for different tasks from the same supplier ensures continuity and makes aspects such as servicing and after sales care much more straightforward.

The majority of Combilifts that come off the production lines in the manufacturing facility in Co. Monaghan are customised according to specific individual requirements, and this has been a key factor in the growing global success of the company. The four-way Combi-CB working in Çuhadaroglu’s ˘ casthouse is a good example of how customised products and teamwork with customers can bear fruit: Combilift’s sales manager for the region, Marc Mariën, worked closely with project manager Tansel Bolat to come up with a range of protective devices that guarantee prolonged operation and reliable and effective performance in the very arduous conditions and in spite of the 850°C heat of the casting unit.

Various heat shields and wheel guards were fitted to the front of the truck, an additional oil cooler and air filter were mounted on the roof and a fork stop attachment prevents castings of all shapes and sizes slipping from the forks. Combilift also supplied quick release hose couplings on the fork carriage for the attachment that has been developed by Çuhadaroglu ˘ for picking castings from the furnace.ᔢ Contact www.combilift.com/www.cuhadaroglu.com

January/February 2014

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44 TRANSPORT & HANDLING - ADVERTORIAL

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Bankable innovation, will it ever be done in the smelter industry?

Recently we had a long discussion at Hencon with a former technical development manager of RTA. In his active time he has been responsible for many innovations and he was for sure ahead of its time on cost savings by developing robot solutions for primary aluminium smelters. His statement was that most primary aluminium smelters like to talk instead of doing something. Obviously as Hencon, we do not agree with this statement, although looking at the general outlook for the industry, his statement is hard to concur.

We now have DX, APX, HYDRO , SAMI, V AMI and RUSAL of principal developers of modern cell technology. All of this has to be proven in long term test labs and carefully monitored, in order to win investorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s trust. With todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s accounting rules the ROI for a primary smelter is not looking that promising and therefore investors are careful.

With the fluctuating LME, Chinese domination of the market and slow economic recovery, building new smelters is a risky business, despite the bright outlook for aluminium consumption.

Since 2008, every mature primary metal producer needs to reach cost savings in existing smelters in the range of $100 to $300 per ton.

Next to that we see an increasing concern of environmental impact of smelters worldwide.

Some of them due to ever increasing awareness of environmental issues, cannot expand further or see their future at stake because the operating licensee will be withdrawn due to not enough progress on environmental issues. Lucky enough since 2008 our clients do make progress on the financial item. Investment budgets for existing plants have been cut to the bone. This had a short term positive effect on the cost per ton, however we do see that in the near future this effect will be maximised. M aintenance budgets of key material handling in most existing smelters are rising, while Overall Equipment Availability is dropping (sometimes down to 50%). Operational managers we speak, openly require more equipment according to their January/February 2014

own standards. Unfortunate the economic outlook is such that this new equipment will not be granted and will not survive the decision rules anticipated. The combination of poor reinvestment budgets, environmental requirements and low OEE is the mouse trap we find most primary smelter managers in these days.

Looking at the above market outlook, it seems to be the technology development manager of RTA is right.

What HENCON has to offer you to stop increasing maintenance costs and OEE reduction?

First of all our product range of well designed reliable equipment in combination with our service modules immediately put your smelter back to the 95% OEE reliability , required for successful operation. As our clients realise this directly gives them a positive impact on the cost per ton, quality control and reliability of their production. But there is more in HENCON equipment. More and more tasks are shared with management real time and automated where possible. T each in technology, together with our unique preventive maintenance program, do show an immediate impact on your financial production results. W e started this programme five years ago and now have over 150 units that

benefit from this approach. W ould you be interested in our flagship products that support this new technologies, call us and ask what our metal tapping and transport solutions, anode transport solutions, vacuum cleaners and other equipment can do to your availability, cost curve and environmental impact. Hencon is sure we can offer you reliable material handling systems for a bright future in primary aluminium. We donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t like to talk, we like to implement proven solutions that surprisingly will drill down your cost sustainable and long lasting for the next 10 years to come.

Therefore we do not believe that Aluminium Industry is all about talking! However it is time to implement material handling systems that work, instead of complaining about it or researching how to make them better over and over again. In this view, the recent decision of a modern smelter to do the metal tapping and transfer with the flexible Hencon Metal Tapping Vehicles is a good example. With Hencon you will find a partner that can offer you this difference you look for!

Aluminium International Today

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46 TRANSPORT & HANDLING

www.aluminiumtoday.com

Truck transportation There have been concerns voiced by some US aluminium companies that if the new trucking regulations, compounded by an ongoing truck driver shortage, are already creating a tightening of availability of the flatbed trucks used to move a great majority of aluminium product at a time when the economy is far from running on all cylinders, what will happen once there is stronger manufacturing activity? By Myra Pinkham* The US economy has been improving, albeit much slower than many would like.

There have been some positive indicators of US manufacturing activity, including the Institute of Supply M anagement’s manufacturing purchasing managers’ index increasing progressively each month resulting in November’s reading reaching 57.3 points in November – its highest reading since April 2011. The group ways that it expects further growth in the manufacturing sector next year.

Still US manufacturing activity, including that in aluminium consuming industries, remains below pre-recessionary levels.

“While some markets, such as the automotive and housing sectors are improving, employment and consumer spending is still fairly constrained and companies are not yet investing all that much in their facilities,” notes Ken Kremar, principal consultant for the industrial practice of IHS Global Insight, New York.

Nevertheless there has been at least a limited constraint in the availability of certain trucking equipment even in this environment of only modest economic growth, especially with new federal hours of service regulations.

According to Dave Osiecki, senior vice president for policy and regulatory affairs

with the Arlington-based American Trucking Association, the new hours of service rules that went into effect in July 2013, which restricts the hours that truck drivers can drive to a maximum of 10 hours after eight consecutive hours off duty, could result in a three to five percent decrease on their productivity. “While that isn’t all that significant, it could have an impact on not just the availability of trucks, but also upon the costs to both shippers and their customers.”

James Elliott, North American logistics manager for Novelis Inc., Atlanta, explains that hours of service don’t only include driving, but also loading time, so if they wait on line for four hours to get loaded up, that only leaves them six hours that they can drive before stopping. Also, since the drivers are paid only for the hours they drive, they are only paid for those six hours.

The impact is even greater upon drivers of the flatbed trucks that aluminium producers use to ship their products, according to Elliott, who explains that most of the heavy duty trucks on the road are enclosed vans with most trucking companies having much smaller fleets of flatbed trucks. “Also flatbed trucks require more from their drivers,” he says, as the load has to be secured down.

Kremar says that even though there hasn’t been a radical change, it has resulted in a slight increase in the cost of shipping and for a little less favourable availability of trucks, which, he says, will only get worse as the economy, therefore the amount of freight hauled, picks up.

Also the availability varies state by state, John Lapides, president of United Aluminum Corp., maintains: “It is hard to get flatbed trucks in Kentucky, which is a state that has a lot of metal production.”

Further complicating the situation is the fact that there continues to be a fairly serious shortage of drivers, although that shortage is not being felt quite as much now as it was prior to the economic downturn, according to Mike Southwood, senior North American aluminium consultant for CRU Group.

“However, if the economy progresses the way it is expected to in 2014 it could be more of an issue,” he says.

Part of the reason for the shortage, Osiecki says, is because of demographics, while part is because of the tougher trucking regulations requiring all truck drivers to have clean safety records. “It isn’t the kind of lifestyle that many people want so it could be difficult to get the next batch of professionally trained, competent drivers.”

Picture courtesy of Novelis

January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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www.aluminiumtoday.com

Novelis is working on a logistics strategy to attract and retain the truck drivers as the carriers that the aluminium company uses.

Elliott says that this programme is based on the premise that most truck drivers want to, whenever possible be home every night.

Given that with the new hours of service US truck drivers generally drive an average of about 500 miles per day, Elliott says that Novelis is looking to set up a route that would allow drivers to just go to a midpoint (about 250 miles from where they started), drop off their trailers there and bring a return trailer home from that point. M eanwhile another driver would meet at that same midpoint, pick up their trailer and bring it closer to the final destination.

“I don’t see the driver shortage getting better,” Elliott says. “In fact it could get worse.” If the driver shortage, and therefore truck availability, gets worse as the economy improves, aluminium producers will continue to find the trucks they need, although they will need to pay more for them, Southwood says. “As they will need to recoup those higher transportation costs, it could support higher Midwest premiums.”

He says it could also result in the use of

Aluminium International Today

TRANSPORT & HANDLING 47

more lightweight truck trailers, including those made from aluminium, so the carriers can haul more freight per truck. “With the more stringent fuel efficiency requirements for trucks it would make a lot of sense as trucking companies want to be able to haul as much as they can legally while saving fuel costs whenever they can.”

There has also been a push to increase the allowable gross weight of trucks to up to 97,000 lbs. so that they can haul heavier loads by equipping those trucks with a sixth axle with a brake on it for a slightly higher user fee, Lapides points out.

A federal bill to this effect, the Safe and Efficient T ransportation Act (SET A) was introduced in the House of Representatives

by Rep. M ichael M ichaud (D -M e.) in February 2013 and is being considered by the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit.

Elliott says that certain states, such as Kentucky and Indiana, have passed similar laws. He says that such legislation, with appropriate restrictions to protect the condition of the nation’s roads and bridges, would be positive for the aluminium industry given that under current federal regulations a truck can only haul one coil of aluminium at a time given

that each coil tends to weigh somewhere between 30,000 to 35,000 lbs. apiece. But if producers could get permits to ship two coils per truck, it could cut the amount of trucks they need in half while giving either the states or the federal government additional revenue from the necessary permits to do this.

This, Lapides says, would also help with highway congestion, which he notes has become an increasing problem.

“With increased need for just-in-time deliveries that means more trucks on the road, not just for aluminium, but for all products,” Lapides says, noting that this comes at a time when, according to the American Society of Civil Engineers, one in nine of the nation’s bridges are rated as structural deficient and that it would take federal, state and local governments increasing their bridge investments by $8 billion per year through 2028 to address the identified $76 billion in needs for deficient bridges across the United States.

“We need to reduce these product choke points and to increase bridge maintenance,” Lapides says. “If you want a harvest in the fall, you need to plant in the spring. If you want a good economy you need to invest in the infrastructure.” ᔢ

January/February 2014

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48 TRANSPORT & HANDLING

www.aluminiumtoday.com

Hot metal transport Yannick Larrivé* looks at what to consider when implementing a Manufacturing Execution System (MES) to optimise the transport management of aluminium between reduction and casthouse, during the commissioning of a green field smelter.

In a previous article (September/October 2009 issue of Aluminium International Today), KEOPS Technologies explained how challenging the management of transport of hot metal can be – especially in large smelting facilities – because the production of hot metal is a continuous process that can be referred to as a “push” process, and the casting process is a batch process frequently driven by specific customer alloy requests.

The article also showed, that by deploying a M anufacturing Execution System (MES) that provides functionalities to schedule the smelting and casting operations and to align those schedules, the utilisation of an M ES will lead to a major improvement in the effective and efficient management of the transport of hot metal in a smelter . Some mentioned benefits were: • Reduced crucible movement in the potline resulting in an increase in the number of pots tapped • Increased potline capacity use • Increased number of crucibles delivered • Reduced delivery time to the furnace • Reduced heat loss and energy consumption • Increased furnace capacity use • Accurate match of quality in hot metal and alloy requirements.

This article discusses aspects that can impact the implementation of these MES functionalities in a smelter plant, especially a green field plant. Some of these aspects are related to systems integration and schedule execution and can lead to ondemand rescheduling.

Integrating schedule

Generally, the Casting Schedule is generated by an Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) system. To generate the schedule, the APS requires data that is often available in the M ES such as Production Requests generated by the ERP from Customer Requests, Product Information, Production Rules, Equipment Definition, and Availability and M aterial Definition. The APS can also consider metal used for other sources such as re-melting, recycling or dross processing centres.

To integrate all these elements, interfaces

need to be defined between the MES and ERP as well as between the APS and MES. Because in most, if not all, implementations, MES has interfaces with both APS and ERP . Having an interface between APS and ERP is not advised. This reduces the number of communication channels and touch-points and therefore reduces the amount of troubleshooting and failures. Having a MES based on an ISA-95 Object M odel helps develop an interface model that is well understood by all parties and implemented quickly.

In a majority of plants, the potline control system or MES is often provided by the potline technology supplier and often owns information about hot metal availability and quality . Therefore an interface is developed to exchange this information with the casthouse M ES, ensuring that the hot metal tapping/delivery schedule can be generated. This information is usually made available when the metal height in the pots is measured. The hot metal availability and quality information is then processed by an advanced algorithm that groups the pots together for the tapping operation. That advanced algorithm often uses linear programming to achieve optimal tapping operations.

From the pot grouping information and the casting schedule, the hot metal delivery schedule is generated and pushed to the potline control system or M ES by synchronising the Tapping Operations and the Casting Schedule. An important factor to consider when publishing the hot metal delivery schedule is that the potline and the casthouse may not be operating on the same shift schedule, which can have an impact on how and when the hot metal delivery schedule is published.

performed later or earlier or even that the hot metal be substituted by tapping pots other than the one planned to be tapped.

Depending on the implementation of the potline control system or M ES and equipment available, this information may or may not be updated and sent to the casthouse MES. Similar issues can arise for T reatment Stations and Holding F urnaces as hot metal is delivered to the casthouse. In most cases, the hot metal is considered delivered to the casthouse when it arrives at a Treatment Station. At this point, the Treatment Station expects T reatment Recipe P arameters, which are normally determined by the hot metal planned furnace destination. However, the planned furnace of a hot metal delivery might not be available to receive the hot metal because it is not early or late on the casting schedule, or the furnace is started against furnace scheduled operations different than originally planned.

As it is mostly the bottleneck of operations, the availability of Casting Centres has a considerable impact on the adherence to the schedule. If a Casting Centre is not available because of an unplanned downtime, this can lead to an overflow of hot metal coming to the upstream furnaces.

Information availability

Because the transport of hot metal implies that some personnel and equipment are mobile, providing them with the right information at the right moment is crucial.

Having the information as soon as it is available can help streamline the hot metal delivery and improve decision making.

Network coverage and devices available to the personnel can vary from few locations with fixed M ES stations with wired network to mobile MES stations with WiFi Equipment availability network.

During the commissioning phase, the To reduce those issues, On-demand Reavailability of equipment that is used in the tapping and transport of hot metal, such as Assignment (either manually or overhead cranes and transport vehicles, can automatically) must be performed so that the schedules are resynchronised based on vary greatly. It is not uncommon to see the actual operation status. stoppages or other events that make the equipment unavailable.

This affects the timely delivery of hot On-demand re-assignment metal to the casthouse. This means that the Upon reception of hot metal, an inspection planned tapping of hot metal can be is performed on the planned furnace

*Senior Casthouse MOM Consultant, KEOPS, Montreal, Canada January/February 2014

Aluminium International Today

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TRANSPORT & HANDLING 49

www.aluminiumtoday.com

destination. If the destination is not available a new destination must be selected. Because the treatment station is expecting operation parameters, this decision must be taken quickly . To allow this, a cascade update of trip destinations is performed. It takes into account Estimated Delivery Times, started Holding Furnaces, and aligns late not-started planned Furnaces with the current time.

This improves the short-term hot metal Delivery Schedule. This operation can be performed automatically by the system but there might be situations where a manual intervention is required. T ypically, this would mean having no started furnace that can receive that specific quality of hot metal. This information might be sent back to the potline MES or control system based on its requirements or functionalities.

Having the casting schedule updated to reflect the current status also helps archive a better schedule of hot metal delivery .

Implementing a process that pushes the Casting Schedule back in time based on current status but without re-sequencing the scheduled casts will improve the quality of the mid-term T rip Delivery Schedule.

Lastly, using a solver to optimise T rip Delivery Schedule by taking into account constraints such as chemistry , F urnace

APS

ERP

Casting operations scheduling

Production planning

Casthouse MES

Keops focuses on the development, integration, and deployment of Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES).

Casthouse MES Generate hot metal availability

Hot metal tapping

Pot grouping optimisation

On-demand crucible reassignment

Trip delivery scheduling

Casting schedule offsetting

Trip delivery optimisation

Process control system Crucible weighing & treatment

Charge target weights, crucible turnaround times and by minimising lateness in the casting schedule will enable the system to automatically mix different grades in furnaces (bad quality, hot metal dilution).

A typical cost function to minimise could be as follows: Sum of costs of deviation of hot metal chemistry vs. target F urnace Hot M etal Grade - Sum of Furnace Completion Costs + Sum of crucibles waiting time costs + Sum of Delay on Casting costs.

This will improve the long-term hot metal delivery schedule.

Benefits

The implementation of a M ES in the casthouse area that provides advanced scheduling functionalities, supported by strong execution and monitoring capabilities, and advanced analysis tools, brings significant improvements to casthouse operations with respect to the management of the crucibles transporting hot metal. á&#x201D;˘

Contact www.keops.com

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Aluminium International Today

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January/February 2014

brochot_30_AIT_0110 1/10/14 9:33 AM Page 1

50 TRANSPORT & HANDLING - ADVERTORIAL

by Brochot

The Berger 3rd generation of special vehicle Brochot, recognised as an innovative design and manufacturing company , decided to develop its third generation of vehicle for today’s challenges.

Brochot has 36 years of experience within the vehicle market. So far, Brochot has delivered 131 vehicles and our vehicles last - that makes us a reference within the aluminium market. This longevity and sturdiness is linked to the careful choice of the main components and our unique expertise.

We present you the new ‘’Berger’’ vehicles and the efforts deployed by Brochot’s design team to provide to the aluminium industry the most reliable and flexible vehicle. In addition to the requirements of the smelters, the new vehicles will offer an unparalleled comfort and safety for operators.

To achieve this excellent result, we developped the vehicle in partnership with the users and also with Trois Rivières University of Quebec for the ergonomy of the seat. This approach really makes the difference. Let’s take an inside look into the new generation vehicle!

The best design for operators Brochot’s vehicle design combines state-of-the-art technology and ergonomics to ensure smoothness of operation, comfort and safety of the driver.

The tractor unit design is exactly the same for an Anode Transport Vehicle (ATV) or a Ladle Transport Vehicle (LTV). This allows for trailer exchangeability in a maximum of 2 hours, (by the means of proper tools) and minimises the inventory of spare parts.

We also highlight the long standing experience of Brochot/Berger in developing vehicle instrumentation and controls. In particular we have specially programmed microcontrolled, which enable maintenance teams to retrieve all necessary information.

A new adapted cabin The cabin has been completely redesigned to provide the maximum visibility for the operator. Their comfort is ensured by a suspended cabin cushioned by air springs in addition to the adjustable air suspension seat with driver weight adjustment. The cabin is pressurised with a 45 000 btu air conditioning system. The seat rotation comes with a simplified and reliable brake.

SAFETY FIRST The safety aspect is also of major importance. New stairs and guardrails provide better secure access for January/February 2014

operator. One safety exit on each side is also available in case of problem. The cabin is sound proof with a noise level below 70dB (A). Finally , another important detail, the operator sits in the centre of the cabin for easy driving.

All accessories and controls of the vehicle are readily available close to the operator in the armrests. Left and right armrests are equipped with the different commands related to the vehicle. Driving of the vehicle is done using the joystick located on the right armrest. The joystick controls left and right movement of the vehicle.

Each armrest is fully adjustable in height and the right armrest also provides additional settings.

A control panel with built-in alarms is installed controlling the main parameters of the vehicle.

Drive axle The drive axle is a very sensitive component of the drive system. Particular attention has been paid to this component to ensure reliability. A temperature sensor transmits a signal to the control system which gives information to the maintenance department.

ENVIRONMENT Electrics and control system An in-depth study of the electrical layout has been done to minimise wiring harness. The control system uses microcontrollers and modules connected using state of the art network at each location with a control box which includes fuses and relays.

The system uses three microcontrollers with one installed in the cabin, one in the tractor unit and the other one in the trailer. All keyboards as well as the control panel also use the same communication network.

The use of this communication tool greatly simplified the control system which will bring significant gains in vehicle maintenance.

The lowest diesel consumption on the market The new generation vehicle is equipped with a 4 cylinder diesel engine. While the engine is adequately powered for the specified duty and suitable for heavy-duty operation and tough climatic conditions, its 4 cylinders will also offer the lowest diesel consumption on the market.

This engine combines proven full-authority electronic controls with the reliable performance of the world’s most successful and durable engine designs.

Low-M aintenance fuel filters assembly design to

match international regulation related to air filtration, exhaust and sound proofing system.

Steering The steering of the vehicle is uses a unique hydraulic pivot. Compared to the previous generation, the pivot has been largely reinforced with oversized ball joints to minimise the maintenance.

An automatic greasing system has been installed for easy replacement of specific components. An end of stroke encoder increases the safety by monitoring the position of the pivot at all times while the pressure of the direction cylinder is constantly monitored.

Special development A new important feature is the telematics and data logging system. This system can acquire wide range of different data from the vehicle. The system is transmits the information every minute to a website via mobile phone to indicate the status of the vehicle operation and maintenance periods.

Data examples: • Engine RPM • Hours of use • Hours of use for the engine • Oil pressure • Hydraulic pressure, etc...

The system also transfers alarms with dates and occurrences to ease diagnostic and follow-up.

A shock monitoring system has also been implemented on the new generation vehicle.

The system can provide a lot of information to the which helps maintenance and operation.

What will the future be for Aluminium smelter vehicles?

Is a fully electric vehicle a dream? What’s the ideal solution? Handling system vehicle? Other means?

What should definitely happen is that designers must work along with the end users to create the best solutions and pursue innovation.

New components and new technologies are constantly arriving in the market place. Brochot’s designers are in touch with these developments so that we maintain our technological lead and continue to provide innovative and optimised solutions.

Do not hesitate to contact us to discuss further opportunities as well as technical improvements and how we can meet your new request.

Aluminium International Today

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54 ROLLING

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Problem solving at a cold rolling mill Innoval Technology identified periodic surface markings on products manufactured through a customer’s rolling mill as ‘mill chatter marks.’ Using vibration measurement technology the company identified a work roll bearing defect. By Vicente Martin* & Tom Farley**, Innoval Technology Ltd Innoval Technology provides specialised aluminium product and process consultancy services. Thanks to sound technical capabilities and extensive experience in aluminium manufacturing, the company’s multi-disciplinary teams are able to provide the right mix of skills and expertise to identify the root cause of any quality issue. An example of this is illustrated in the following case study.

One of its customers was experiencing periodic surface markings on products manufactured through one of their rolling mills. These markings were preventing them from supplying high surface quality material from this particular mill.

The defect appeared as alternative light and dark transversal stripes on both surfaces of the strip seen under carefully controlled lighting conditions. Spacing of these stripes was regular and measured to be between 20mm and 25mm. No significant change of thickness was measured on the strip and the stripes were more prevalent on fully annealed material.

From the spacing of the defect and knowledge of the mill speed at the time, the frequency of the defect can be easily calculated. Strip marking results from forced vibrations acting on the work rolls and these may be amplified by the natural resonances of the rolling mill, which are typically between 500Hz and 1000Hz and are often referred to as the 5th octave resonances of the mill. In this case, the forced vibration had a lower frequency and was of sufficient amplitude to mark the strip without excitation of any 5th octave resonance.

Innoval consultants identified these stripes as mill chatter marks and arranged for vibration measurements to be carried out on the mill.

Accelerometers were attached to each of the roll chocks, sensing motion in the vertical direction, with another accelerometer on the gearbox and a tachometer monitoring rotational speed from a drive coupling.

Innoval personnel analysed the vibration measurement on the mill, as the mill speed was varied, to properly capture and understand the motion of the rolls.

The vibration spectrum showed a significant peak developing at low rolling speeds. The frequency of this peak increased in direct proportion to the

0.12

Fig 1 Vibration spectrum (acceleration in units of g) from a work roll chock at 470 mpm showing forced vibration peak at 315 Hz

0.1

0.08

0.06

0.04

0.02

0

100

200

Bearing defect type Inner race defect Outer race defect Roller element defect

300

400

500

700

800

Hz

Fundamental defect frequency [Hz]

Table 1 Fundamental work roll bearing defect frequencies for a shaft speed of 1 Hz

18.66 16.34 7.53

rolling speed and the vibration amplitude of this peak also increased with rolling speed. At 470m/min the peak frequency was close to 315Hz. Fig 1 shows a typical vibration acceleration spectrum from one of the work roll chock sensors at a rolling speed of 470m/min.

Converting acceleration amplitude to displacement showed that the displacement of the roll chocks increased to approximately 0.6 microns at the highest rolling speeds.

This level of displacement is significant relative to the surface roughness of the strip and creates the pattern of chatter marking observed.

This type of speed-dependent vibration will be a mechanical forced vibration within the rolling mill, for example, due to a defective gear or bearing. Data was collected for all potential sources of forced vibration and careful analysis of the vibration data showed the source to be a work roll bearing defect.

Table 1 shows the fundamental work roll bearing defect frequencies based on a 1Hz work roll rotation frequency. Rolling at 470m/min corresponds to a work roll frequency of 505 rpm (8.42 Hz) and the forced vibration peak is observed at 37.3 times the work roll frequency , which corresponds to the first harmonic (2x) of the fundamental inner race defect of 18.66 x 8.42Hz. Observations at other rolling speeds were able to confirm this result.

It can be seen in Fig 1 that there are sidebands either side of the forced vibration peak. The spacing of these

* Vicente Martin, senior process engineer; **Tom Farley, managing director, Innoval Technology January/February 2014

600

Fig 2 Defects in work roll bearing inner races

sidebands is an exact multiple of the rotational frequency of the work roll, which is commonly seen for inner race defects where the inner race is rotating.

The defect rotates through a variable load zone and produces a modulated time waveform which is seen as a peak with sidebands in the vibration spectrum.

A survey of mill elements known to contribute to chatter was made, identifying defects in the work roll bearing inner races that were likely to create similar markings to the ones experienced in the mill, as shown in Fig 2 . These defects were present in all the mill work rolls and were likely created during the chocking and de-chocking operations.

After re-conditioning the bearing races and improving the chocking operation the plant was able to eliminate the strip markings and manufacture products from this mill with the highest surface quality. ᔢ Contact: www.innovaltec.com

Aluminium International Today

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56 AUTOMOTIVE

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Aluminium manufacturers set for automotive boom British aluminium manufacturers and suppliers should take advantage of the significant growth in demand for the metal in the automotive sector , delegates at a crucial industry conference were told.

The ALFED Aluminium in Road Transport conference, which took place at Thinktank Birmingham in November 2013, attracted more than 100 representatives from companies ranging from Jaguar Land Rover and T oyota to Norton Aluminium and Superform.

Amongst the speakers were renowned motoring pundit Quentin Willson, leading industry academic Professor David Bailey and analyst P aul W illiams, of London based CRU, which specialises in commodities analysis and consultancy.

Conference

Leading engineers from major car manufacturers and global aluminium suppliers took to the podium to offer their thoughts on industry trends and direction.

Mr Williams of CRU told the conference that there was a global rush for aluminium.

He said: “W e can expect to see five percent year-on-year growth in aluminium demand for the foreseeable future, with transportation demand growing closer to seven per cent per annum.

“Aluminium is the success story and automotive is the key to unlock its potential.”

Aluminium use in cars has been growing annually since 1970 and by 2020 the global automotive sector will be using two million tonnes per year.

Will Savage, CEO of ALFED, said: “This growth presents a huge opportunity for companies to enter the supply chain providing a whole range of products and services to car makers, from processing to design.

Currently, on many cars made in Britain only 30% of components are produced in the UK but over the next few years, we will be working with industry and the Government to change that.”

Market developments

The UK’s seven volume car manufacturers

By Alan Arthur*

along with commercial vehicle and niche car counterparts are sourcing from around 2,500 component suppliers across the country.

Driven by vehicle emission targets and the light-weighting of road vehicles, there are £3bn worth of supply chain opportunities in the coming years.

The UK Aluminium industry generates more than £3.2bn annually and directly employs in excess of 20,000 people. This is a significant contributor to the economy and is set to grow year-on-year.

The UK remains the only major vehicle market with positive growth in Europe; car sales were up by 12.1% in September and are up by 10.8% in 2013 so far.

Prof. Bailey, of Aston Business School, acknowledged that “the UK Government is doing some positive things to support the manufacturing industry but it needs to increase its support by an order of magnitude to meet the growth potential, as this is a great story for the UK economy.” ᔢ

*Marketing & Communications Executive, Aluminium Federation Ltd (ALFED), UK

6TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ELECTRODES FOR PRIMARY ALUMINIUM SMELTERS INCORPORATING THE 6TH RODDING CONFERENCE 13 –15 MAY 2014 HILTON NORDICA HOTEL, REYKJAVIC, ICELAND

A unique opportunity for all those involved in anode rodding, cathode installation/ repair and general support services to meet, discuss recent technological advances and explore developments in the aluminium industry. The conference will discuss both anodes and cathodes - emphasis will be placed on environmental issues, increasing productivity and future prospects in the aluminium industry.

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Innovation across the industry Martin Jarrett, Technology Director of Constellium’s Automotive Structures and Industry business unit, highlights how research and development is an integral part of product innovation.

technological trends related to its strategic activities.

1. How are things going at Constellium?

Things are going well and in line with our strategy. We’ve recently reported our Q3 results where we highlighted that our performance was supported by favourable demand and improving market share in the automotive sector and also in the aerospace sector.

5.

Are there any research and development projects in place?

2.

What are the big issues affecting the secondary aluminium industry today?

Some of the issues facing the industry as a whole today revolve around sustainable growth, resource optimisation and recycling. The aluminium industry covers key activities such as ore extraction and initial processing, transformation into semi-products – where Constellium operates – and the lifecycle of the finished products, which can be recycled.

Aluminium is an energy intensive industry. Although this energy is primarily focused on upstream extraction and smelting, Constellium is determined to maximise the efficiency of its further downstream aluminium operations and continue to develop recycling. Aluminium is rather unique because it can be recycled over and over again without loss of properties. Aluminium scrap recycling is therefore a key feature of Constellium’s commitment to sustainability. Up to 95% of the energy required for primary aluminium production can be saved by recycling.

As part of a chain, Constellium is acting to ensure that recycling rates increase in the markets it operates. Major improvements can happen if the whole aluminium value chain is involved, from suppliers through to customers. One of the company’s aims is to contribute to increase the recycling rate of beverage cans in Europe, from 67% in 2010 to 75% by 2015. Our role is not limited to recycling cans in our own facilities, but to supporting a system that makes it possible to collect and process used cans.

3.

What products are proving the most lucrative?

Constellium has been exiting the commodity product segment and is strongly committed to developing and manufacturing high-value added,

Aluminium International Today

innovative and sustainable products that meet our customers’ needs in the aerospace, automotive and packaging markets. Looking at the aerospace market as an example, AIRW ARE technology delivers a range of products designed for every part of the aircraft structure (fuselage, wings and tail fins). Not only can this technology deliver up to 25% weight reduction and therefore lower CO 2 emissions, but its 100% recyclability also makes a major contribution to a sustainable aerospace industry.

4.

Do you see Constellium as an innovator within the industry?

We see innovation not just as a business advantage but as a company requisite, and are aiming to achieve 10% of our total sales from innovative products by 2015 from 4.5% in 2012. Our Research Centre works closely with customers to deliver on this goal. Constellium also has partnerships with about 40 universities and international research laboratories, further enhancing its ability to deliver advanced solutions. Most recently, we announced a new research centre partnership with Jaguar Land Rover and Brunel University in the UK. The company has recently brought together six academic materials experts to create the Constellium’s International Scientific Council. The Council’s mandate is to nurture and broaden our global scientific vision and perspective on relevant emerging domains, key drivers, and

Our R&D centre located in Voreppe, France, is the largest research centre dedicated to aluminium in W estern Europe, and hosts 200 senior -level specialists and is central to Constellium’s capacity for innovation, from research to market launch. The R&D centre is structured around multidisciplinary teams dedicated to aerospace, automotive, rigid packaging and process technology, so we have many projects to prepare for the future and answer customers’ requirements in our three strategic markets (aerospace, automotive, packaging).

Innovation is a critical ingredient of our DNA. It’s a continuous investment and commitment within the company . As an example, we’ve recently announced an innovative aluminium solution for functional surfaces with highly demanding technical requirements. ST AYBRIGHT is a long lasting, aluminium product used in decorative trims for cars.

In addition to utilising R&D for the development of new products, we commit to researching ways to improving the aluminium metal production process as well as the impact of our business on the environment.

6.

Is there a lot of focus on light weighting value-added products?

Our customers look constantly at light weighting their own products to match with international regulation and act as responsible companies. In beverage packaging for example, the lightweight, shatterproof and safety-related benefits of aluminium present a favourable alternative to glass bottles. Constellium’s use of Drawn W all Ironing technology - rather than impact extrusion - has led to a 50% weight saving in the development of an aluminium bottle. Available in matt or reflective finishes, it also is re-sealable, a plus for consumers on the move.

The EcoRange body structure system for bus builders combines standard structural components and bolted connections based on proven aluminium and composite design in order to develop, design and build lightweight and costJanuary/February 2014

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â&#x20AC;&#x153;OUR DNA IS BASED ON A STRONG CUL TURE OF INNOVATION, SUSTAINABILITY AND PERFORMANCE.â&#x20AC;?

AIRWARE technology delivers a range of products designed for every part of the aircraft structure.

Design capacity has also allowed the company to deliver to its automotive customers innovative crash management systems. The system is based on a lightweight car bumper beam and two inserted crash boxes that are designed to protect the integrity of the whole automobile structure. The system plays a critical role in making cars safer for the driver, passengers and pedestrians in the event of an accident. On top of that, they save vehicle weight: Between 2 to 3kg for the strategically important area in the front of the car.

7.

How do you view Constelliumâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s development over the short-to-mid term in relation to the global aluminium industry? What does Constellium have in store for 2014?

efficient buses and coach buses. T o date the system has been used to build more than 35,000 buses. The EcoRange toolkit helps manufacturers reduce bus and coach body shell weight, hence lowering CO 2 emissions.

Constellium works closely with automotive manufacturers on the design and production of structural body-in-white (BIW) components and modules from the earliest development stage through to production.

Your Technology Partner in Aluminium Innoval Technology provides independent world-class expertise to the global aluminium industry.

Constellium is a global sector leader that develops innovative, value-added aluminium products for aerospace, automotive and packaging applications.

Our DNA is based on a strong culture of innovation, sustainability and performance.

Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re committed to continuously innovate and offer lighter , safer and infinitely recyclable solutions to the markets in which we operate. á&#x201D;˘

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