NEW YORK (Commodity Online): Alcoa (NYSE:AA) has planned to increase the aluminium production capacity by 120,000 meteric tons per year and also to reduce green house gas emissions during the next five year.
The company would invest around $2.1 billion for its Baie-Comeau, Deschambault and Becancour smelters in Quebec.
The plan includes 25-year power contracts for all three smelters and allows the aluminum smelter in Baie-Comeau to immediately undertake the last engineering phase of its modernization project, with plans to have a new potline in service by the end of 2015.
In addition, the preliminary engineering phase of the Deschambault smelter’s amperage increase project will be launched as early as the end of this year. The investments will allow Alcoa to optimize every mega-watt-hour of power used in the Quebec smelters.
As part of the modernization at Baie-Comeau, the older smelting pots using Soderberg technology will be replaced with an all-new electrolysis potline developed by Alcoa with an annual production capacity of 160,000 metric tons.
The enhancements will reduce the plant’s greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent. Through technology advancements made at Alcoa’s global Smelting Center of Excellence, the plan will also allow Deschambault to increase its amperage to 405,000 amperes by 2016, increasing the plant’s capacity by 25,000 metric tons per year.
Roughly 6,800 job-years will be sustained during the construction phase of the Baie-Comeau modernization, generating about $500 million in economic spin-offs.
“The Government of Québec has clearly envisioned the mutual benefits stemming from this new investment plan, and that’s what enables us to look to the future with confidence and Moving to this next phase in our development program is cause for celebration for our families as well as our communities. I want to thank all our employees who have been essential collaborators in this initiative.” said Pierre Morin, President of Alcoa Canada Global Primary Products.
The five-year investment plan will have positive economic impacts on Québec as well. Alcoa will provide $50million into an economic development fund managed by the Government of Québec, and create a $25 million Sustainable Development Fund dedicated to its three host communities. This fund is in addition to the partnership agreement of $3million that Alcoa recently signed with the new Centre for Sustainable Development located in the heart of Montréal.
