Performance
Feature
Technology widens energy advantage
Electrical energy is so crucial to making aluminium, and the process is so energy intensive, that the metal is sometimes called "solid electricity".
Ninety four per cent of Rio Tinto Alcan's energy supply for its smelter power requirements is secured on a long term basis, with 64 per cent coming from clean, sustainable hydroelectricity and 11 per cent from nuclear energy.
In addition, technology developed by Rio Tinto Alcan is leveraging this favourable energy supply to greater effect. "High energy costs serve to underscore the benefits of our benchmark AP smelting technology in terms of low per-unit energy consumption," says Jacynthe Côté, chief executive, Rio Tinto Alcan.
While the power position is one of Rio Tinto Alcan's critical success factors, "from a sustainable development perspective, maximising the use of renewable energy sources like hydro and nuclear clearly makes sense. Our AP30 series is currently the industry's most environmentally friendly smelter technology, and all plants using this technology are firmly in the first quartile of the industry energy cost curve."
Rio Tinto Alcan is now developing even better smelting technology, helped by collaboration between science teams and researchers from Rio Tinto and the former Alcan. The focus is on energy efficient technologies such as the experimental AP-Xe which could deliver even lower energy consumption as well as positive environmental impacts.
AP-Xe is not a single technology but a suite of technologies already in varying stages of development, deployed in combination towards improving energy efficiency and achieving greenhouse gas reductions. All the key components of AP-Xe are currently undergoing trials in operating cells at various Rio Tinto Alcan smelters. Over the next three to five years, these separate components will progressively be combined in various trial groups.