Winter Park, Florida 19/01/2016 - Alcoa will delay the curtailment of its 230,000 tonne per year Intalco Works smelter in Ferndale, Washington, until the end of the second quarter of 2016, according to a Monday release.
The company had intended to stop output by the end of the first quarter. However, recent changes in energy and raw material costs made it more cost effective in the near term to keep the smelter operating to provide molten metal to the plant’s casthouse, which will remain open when the smelter does finally close.
In previously announced company news, Alcoa will permanently close its Warrick Operations primary aluminium smelter in Evansville, Indiana, by the end of the first quarter. The smelter has a capacity of 269,000 tonnes and is closing due to low aluminium prices.
In November, Alcoa said that it will keep its Massena West primary aluminium smelter in New York open after receiving $38 million in incentives from the state. The company has planned on idling the 130,000-tonne-per-year smelter in the first quarter of this but that was met with serious resistance from state and federal politicians.
Once all the announced curtailments and closures are complete, Alcoa will have removed approximately 25 percent operating smelting capacity and approximately 20 percent of operating alumina refining capacity by mid-2016 .
Alcoa will then have 2.1 million tonnes of operating smelting capacity and 12.3 million tonnes of operating alumina refining capacity remaining.