Hydro develop 'midstream' operations

摘要

Jon-Harald Nilsen, Executive VP of Hydro Aluminium believes the company is in a special position to supply the highest quality 'secondary' aluminium billet to its customers. Speaking to Aluminium International Today at the Al USA show in Chicago, Mr Nilsen regretted the use of the term 'secondary' applied to metal recovered from scrap as this implied an inferior product to primary which was certainly not the case in the carefully selected scrap used by Hydro. The company has coined the word 'midstream' to describe its activities of melting, alloying and casting from existing metal. Of Hydro's 3.5Mt output in 2004, 1.9Mt was produced by remelting scrap which saves 95 percent of the energy requirement compared to primary production. Hydro receives most of its scrap under 'return' agreements from its customers thereby receiving 'prompt' scrap of known composition and also buys in prompt scrap from other sources. Typically 8-10 percent of primary metal is also blended with the charge, although this may be as high as 30 percent if insufficient scrap is available in the locality. The company had not been greatly affected by the high demand for scrap from China but did acknowledge that Chinese purchases of alumina for primary production had pushed up these prices. He did not see China as a major threat as an exporter because their high energy costs made them uncompetitive and the government has taken steps to reduce exports as a means of conserving energy. Hydro has made small investments in China, building a precision lube plant for heat exchangers and a remelt facility for magnesium to upgrade the locally produced metal. This follows the closure of its magnesium production plant in Norway in the face of Chinese competition, although it is still producing magnesium at Becancour Quebec. Quizzed on magnesium's competition with aluminium, Mr Nilsen believes output will remain too low to be completive in all but a few applications.