18 March
London,
Dow Jones

LONDON (Dow Jones)- Rio Tinto Alcan said Tuesday that it is firmly positioned to meet growing global demand for alumina, with its Yarwun alumina refinery achieving record performance in November and December, and with significant progress being made on the refinery expansion project.

With increased production at Yarwun, and expansion of the Gove refinery, Rio Tinto Alcan will double its Australian alumina capacity by 2015.

Expansion work on the Yarwun alumina refinery, near Gladstone, Queensland is progressing on budget and is on track for its first shipment of alumina in the second half of 2010. The US$1.8bn project, announced in July 2007, will more than double annual production of the refinery, taking output from 1.4 million tonnes to 3.4 million tonnes by 2011.

The expansion project includes a gas-based 160 MW cogeneration plant which will reduce CO2 emissions per tonne of alumina by 35% relative to coal.

"In the eight months since the expansion project began, engineering is approaching 25% completion with over US$900 million committed by the end of February 2008," Project Director Keith Nugent said.

"There have been no lost time injuries on the project, with more than 400,000 hours worked (as at Feb. 29, 2008) with a current workforce of just over 300 on site. We expect to commence our first major concrete pour at the end of March 2008", he said.

On completion, the expanded refinery, at 3.4 million tonnes per year, will produce about four per cent of the total global alumina demand.

Rio Tinto Alcan Chief Operating Officer — Pacific, Bauxite and Alumina, Alistair Field said the refinery was performing strongly, with recent production the best since the refinery began operating.

"Since implementing a number of process enhancements in October 2007 the plant has delivered record operating performance and further improvements have been identified to exceed nameplate capacity in 2008," Mr Field said.

" Rio Tinto has a defined pathway to become the largest producer of alumna, and we will pursue this, while retaining our focus on excellence in health, safety and environmental performance."