London 04/10/2016 - By Charlotte Radford
Commercial production began at Ma’aden Bauxite and Alumina Company’s mine and refinery on Saturday October 1.
Operations at the alumina refinery will ramp up to 1.8 million tpy by early 2017, majority stakeholder the Saudi Arabian Mining Company (Ma’aden) said on October 2.
At full capacity, the refinery will meet the alumina requirements of the Ma’aden smelter of 1.4 million tpy.
The surplus material will be sold in the local and international markets.
The joint venture refinery is located is Ras Al Khair, Saudi Arabia, and first produced alumina from domestic bauxite in December 2014. The company’s bauxite mine is located a 600km rail journey from the refinery in Al Ba’itha.
The joint venture company will detail the impact of commercial production on its earnings in its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2016.
Ma’aden Bauxite and Alumina Company is 74.9% owned by Ma’aden, and 25.1% owned by Alcoa.
Metal Bulletin, the global metals and mining price reporting agency, recently acquired 100 percent of the shares of FastMarkets Ltd.