15 June
LONDON,
Press Release

KAS Ingot Becomes First Kazakhstani Primary Aluminium Available via the LME

ENRC, a leading diversified natural resources group, is pleased to announce that The London Metal Exchange (‘LME’) has approved with immediate effect the listing of primary aluminium ingots produced at ENRC’s aluminium smelter, Kazakhstan Aluminium Smelter (‘KAS’), located in Pavlodar, Kazakhstan.

Registration of the ingots with the LME provides for their sale into an LME warehouse at LME list prices, which allows ENRC greater flexibility in its sales and marketing operations.

Approval was obtained once the requirements of a rigorous testing process were satisfied. KAS ingots were submitted to two consumers, who judged their fitness for use, and two surveyors, who subjected them to chemical analysis, before the ingots were declared suitable.

This is the first primary aluminium produced in the Republic of Kazakhstan to be made available via the LME.

This listing is another milestone in the rapid development of ENRC’s aluminium business. The construction of KAS, the first state-of-the-art aluminium smelter in the Republic of Kazakhstan, started in May 2005 and completed within an unprecedented 27 months, in December 2007, on budget and ahead of schedule. The smelter reached its full Phase 1 annual production capacity of 125 thousand tonnes per annum in Q2 2008, well ahead of its 2008 year end deadline, and in Phase 2 its capacity is set to double to 250,000 thousand tonnes in 2010.

KAS and the further development of ENRC’s aluminium business are of strategic importance to both ENRC and the region. KAS represents the largest private capital investment in the metals and mining industry in the Republic of Kazakhstan to date, with a total construction cost of US$900m. It is a key element of a significant future aluminium cluster being developed by ENRC within the country, in keeping with the government’s ambitions to promote further domestic processing activity and the
production of higher value added products. ENRC owns and operates a fully integrated aluminium business, including an energy company, bauxite mines, an alumina refinery, the KAS aluminium smelter, and a logistics company.

Jim Cochrane, Head of Sales & Marketing and Head of Business Development of ENRC, commented: “We are delighted to have reached this milestone. In a little over four years we have gone from construction to production to this official recognition of the quality of our primary aluminium product. This enhances the range of options open to us in selling our aluminium, providing another destination for our products in addition to our existing customers.”

About ENRC

ENRC is a leading diversified natural resources group performing integrated mining, processing, energy, logistics and marketing operations. The operations comprise: the mining and processing of chrome, manganese and iron ore; the smelting of ferroalloys; the mining and processing of bauxite for the extraction of alumina and the production of aluminium; coal extraction and electricity generation, and the transportation and sales of Group products. The Group’s production assets are principally located in the Republic of Kazakhstan. The Group’s entities, for the year ended 31 December 2008, employed approximately 67,000 (2007: 64,000) people. In 2008, the Group accounted for approximately 5% of Kazakhstan’s GDP. The Group currently sells its products around the world, including in Russia, China, Japan, Western Europe and the United States. For the year ended 31 December 2008, the Group had revenue of US$6,823 million (2007: US$4,106 million) and profit attributable to equity shareholders of the Group of US$2,642 million (2007: US$798 million).

For further information please see the Group’s website, www.enrc.com.