AlCircle News Edited By "Debanjali Sengupta"
Debanjali Sengupta is a passionate content writer with 10 years of experience in Business writing, Web Content writing, Blogging, Editing and Research. She is responsible for generating and editing content for AlCircle Newsletter and other online and offline content for enhancing the brand value and its visibility among global users.
Hindalco exhibits aluminium bulker and its benefits at INCAL 2019
At the 7 th International Conference on Aluminium and Exhibition (INCAL-2019), Hindalco demonstrated a dry bulk carrier made from indigenous aluminium and showed its enormous benefits. The bulker will be used for carrying cement, fly ash, food grains, PTA powder, and alumina. <iframe width="560" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UQrC2qtggTk" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe> The bulker not only depicts Hindalco’s unmatched capability in India but is also a live proof of demonstration of the benefits of aluminium over steel in such applications, especially to the former’s light weight, lower maintenance cost, and longer life. The size of the bulker is 30 cubic metres and is 2 tonnes...
Metra been the real star in the transportation section of INDO-ITALIAN HUB, with participation to INCAL 2019
In concurrent with INCAL 2019, the INDO-ITALIAN METALHUB programme by ArtValley also continued with great success, targeting at decision makers in the industrial sectors in India and in Italy while focusing on the industrial and cultural exchange between the two countries. The programme Indo-Italian MetalHub continued in 2019 with the participation to INCAL 2019, with the Special Session in particular on “Aluminium in Railways & Transportation”- The challenge of metallurgy in the world of transportation in India. Among many companies that made a strong presence at the seminar, Metra was the “star” in the transportation section. The Italian company was the main protagonist of the Italian mission in India, Bhubaneswar - the host city for INDO-ITALIAN HUB programme & INCAL 2019. In several...
New Day Aluminium announces re-branding of its specialty products business as NICHE
According to a recent report, New Day Aluminium Holdings LLC, the parent company of Noranda Bauxite & Alumina, has rebranded its specialty products business as NICHE, a ready acronym for Noranda Industrial Chemicals. NICHE will include Noranda’s Gramercy-based chemical grade alumina (CGA) business as well as ARC Fused Alumina. ARC Fused Alumina is Noranda’s white fused alumina manufacturing subsidiary in La Bâthie, France. Company Chairman David D’Addario said: “We recently completed a significant expansion of our CGA capacity in Gramercy, so it made perfect sense to operate that part of our business as a separate entity.” He further added, “It also made sense to include our other specialty products business, ARC Fused Alumina, under that same corporate umbrella. With additional...
Aluminium foil containers sales grow globally in 2018 with end-users shift to sustainable packaging: FMI
According to the latest research report by FMI, over 1 million tonnes of aluminium containers were sold globally in 2018. This sales volume is likely to escalate further by 4 per cent year-on-year in 2019, learned the report. Shifting consumer patterns towards effective and sustainable formats could be a factor that stimulated the sales of aluminium foil containers. Unwavering demand from multiple sectors, including foodservice, retail & supermarket, and others further triggered the demand for the containers, found the report. Aluminium foil containers continue to gain immense favour, owing to their superior barrier properties. According to FMI’s analysis, the weight of aluminium is another key aspect enhancing the viability of aluminium foil containers across diverse end-use...
Norway’s aluminium wire exports volume to drop this year but not the revenue
In the successive year of 2017, when Norway’s aluminium wire exports had increased by about 2 per cent from 70,079 tonnes in 2016 to 71,490 tonnes, the country reportedly saw a year-on-year decline in further exports, found our third-party data. {newsStudioGallery} In 2018, Norway’s aluminium wire exports were pegged at 70,735 tonnes, down 1.05 per cent from 2017. 2019 is also estimated to see a plunge in Norway’s aluminium wire exports to 69,479 tonnes, down around 2 per cent year-on-year. But despite the fall in estimated aluminium wire exports volume from Norway this year, the revenue is likely to see a rise, learned the international export-import data. From US$121 million in 2018, Norway’s revenue from wire exports is anticipated to grow to US$123 million in 2019, up about 2 per...
Environmental organisations renew calls on government to stop mining activities in Atewa Forest
Environmental organisations this week reportedly renewed calls on government to stop all mining and prospecting activities in the Atewa Forest Reserve due to grievous repercussions on the country. The environmental groups said the Atewa Forest provided a variety of ecosystem service and other benefits that superseded the financial gains derived from mining bauxite in the forest. The environmental groups were led by ARocha Ghana, Wildlife Society of Ghana, Rainforest Trust, Friends of the Earth-Ghana, International Committee of the Netherlands, and Advocates for Biodiversity Conservation. They asked the government and the China Development Bank to find alternative ways that would enable the Atewa Forest to generate additional financial resources for the state and support the development of...
Aluminium-built Van der Valk motor yacht Jangada sold
Aluminium-built 25-metre motor yacht Jangada, listed for sale by Oceandrive, is sold to the buyer introduced by Y.CO. Delivered in 2015 as a raised pilothouse model, the yacht was built by Netherlands-based superyacht builder Wim Van der Valk Continental Yachts to a design by Guido De Groot. Accommodation is for eight guests in four cabins comprising a master suite, VP suite, and double and twin, with all entertainment centres and en suite bathroom facilities. Guido De Groot has made a clever use of space by designing a few different areas of the yacht. It has included one main office and some spaces where the owner can work on board. It has designed the saloon on the small side, but by opening up the stairway it allows an uninterrupted view from stern all the way forward and gives a...
Beer Institute president McGreevy criticises Trump administration’s tariff on aluminium
According to a recent report, beer industry advocate Jim McGreevy slammed the US tariffs on imported aluminium, accusing that the retaliatory measures hurt brewers and the industry as a whole. He said in an interview to Hill. TV’s Krystal Ball and Buck Sexton: “When you have 6,000 brewers and growing every year, to put those jobs and that industry at risk for the chance of bringing back some jobs, we just don’t see it as the right solution.” McGreevy, the president of The Beer Institute, estimates that Trump’s tariffs have put at least 20,000 industry-dependent jobs at risk. “Aluminium tariffs were meant to bring back jobs that had left the country over the last 50 years for lots of reasons other than what’s happening in other parts of the world,” he said. In March 2018, President Donald...
Xinfa Group reduces its annual alumina production by 500,000 tonnes at a plant in Guangxi
Xinfa Group, one of China’s top aluminium producers, has reduced production at its alumina plant in southern China’s Guangxi region due to tight bauxite SMM-BAUX-GUAXI supply. The news came after a company official and a consultancy reported this to Reuters. The Group has lowered the production by 500,000 tonnes on an annual basis, said the Xinfa official. He further added the plant has a total alumina producing capacity of 3 million tonnes per year. Consultancy Baiinfo said the daily production rate at the Xinfa plant went down from 7,600 tonnes to 6,100 tonnes. The official from Xinfa and from a privately held company with aluminium smelters in Shandong and Xinjiang informed the production cut would be applicable would be in place for at least a month. Earlier in November 2018, China's...
China Hongqiao Group to restart aluminium production as shorter set of winter output cut expires
Chinese state-owned company China Hongqiao Group announced on Friday, February 1, that it would gradually recommence aluminium production from some of its pots after the shorter set of winter output curbs expired on January 31, 2019. During the winter heating season in November 2018, China Hongqiao Group was asked to close up its annual aluminium smelting capacity. The city of Binzhou in Shandong province, where all of Hongqiao’s 6.46 million tonnes per year of aluminium capacity is located, reportedly listed pot closures at five Hongqiao smelting facilities in a document outlining winter restrictions. Some of the closures which had a total production capacity of 8.5 per cent of that of Hongqiao’s were to cut production for December and January instead of the full four-months winter...
Vedanta aims to cut aluminium production cost to $1,700 per tonne
According to a report by Business Standard, Vedanta intends to cut down its aluminium production cost to US$1,700 per tonne from the current cost of US$ 1,900 per tonne. Per the report, the company aims to do this by the end of the financial year. Ajay Dixit, chief executive officer (CEO) of Vedanta’s aluminium and power vertical, said: “We are putting in place a plan to reduce our production cost by the end of this year. The work to this effect has already started.” Vedanta expects that this production cost cut will improve the viability of its aluminium business, especially in the backdrop of recent softening of metal prices on the London Metal Exchange (LME). The LME price of aluminium in April 2018 was at US$2,600 per tonne and now came down to US$1,870 per tonne by January-end of...
Lowered aluminium ingot price and increased billets stocks prompt aluminium alloy price drop
Followed by two back-to-back rises, the A00 aluminium ingot price registers a drop today, on February 1, by RMB 90 per tonne, found Shanghai Metals Market. After increasing on 30 th of January and 31 st of January, the aluminium ingot price had reached RMB 13,390 per tonne, but after a plunge today the price came in at RMB 13,300 per tonne. This same ingot price in China was on the17 th of January. However, the average prices of aluminium ingot today are expected to range between RMB 13,280 per tonne and RMB 13,320 per tonne, with spot discounts to settle at RMB 80 per tonne to RMB 40 per tonne. The rise in primary aluminium social inventories yesterday by around 75,000 tonnes could be a possible reason for this ingot price drop today. In the east (Wuxi and Hangzhou), the aluminium ingot...
Chalco cuts about 200,000 t/y of aluminium production at its Shandong Huayu facility
The Aluminium Corp of China (Chalco) announced on Wednesday, January 30, that it was implementing “flexible production” on about 200,000 tonnes per year of capacity at its Shandong Huayu facility. High electricity tariffs, environmental restrictions, and market environment are some of the factors that prompted the Beijing-based state-owned company for this action. Shanndong Huayu Aluminium and Electricity, with capacity of 220,000 tonnes per year suspended all output on Wednesday, SMM learned. The plant’s capacity of 100,000 tonnes per tonne operated after production cuts in December and November. Huayu’s capacity cut of 50,000 tonnes per year in November was included in Chalco’s announcement of 470,000 tonnes capacity cut on November 30. Chalco had said to the Shanghai Stock Exchange...
Odisha at INCAL invites investors to establish downstream aluminium industries
Some industry stalwarts at the International Conference on Aluminium (INCAL) opined that Odisha offered tremendous opportunities to investors to set up downstream aluminium industries. INCAL-2019, jointly organised by NALCO, Aluminium Association of India and the Ministry of Mines, is taking place in Odisha from January 31 to February 2, under the theme “MAKING ALUMINIUM….DRIVING GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT”. Addressing the event, Industries Department Principal Secretary and IPICOL Chairman Sanjeev Chopra said, “Odisha is now among the top three investment destinations in India and the number one state when it comes to the investment implementation rate.” He further said, “As per Vision 2025 of the State Government, six focus sectors have been identified and efforts are underway to attract...
China’s December aluminium products exports grow on uncertainties over US-China trade tensions
According to China Customs data, the country’s aluminium strip, rod and shapes exports in December stood at 98,500 tonnes, up 31.7 per cent year-on-year and 3.34 per cent month-on-month. For the whole year of 2018, exports of aluminium strip, rod and shapes by China expanded 17.12 per cent and came in at 975,400 tonnes. The products are under HS codes of 76041090, 76042100, 76042990, 7604291 and 76041010. As for the aluminium alloy wheels, China exported 80,800 tonnes in December, up 2.5 per cent from a year earlier, showed data from China Customs. The graph below thus shows that China’s aluminium strip, rod and shapes exports were 22 per cent higher than the exports of aluminium alloy wheels in December 2018. However, although China’s exports volume of aluminium alloy wheels grew in...
Bauxite price in the spot Chinese market records a drop but ingot price registers back-to-back rise
After almost two months, the spot price of bauxite recorded a change on January 28, according to Shanghai Metals Market. The bauxite price dipped by RMB 20 per tonne and stood at RMB 550 per tonne. Prior to this, the aluminium ore price was at RMB 570 per tonne from December 3, 2018, to January 27, 2019. Although the bauxite price remained restraint over the last two months at RMB 570 per tonne and even registered drop from RMB 590 per tonne towards the end of October and RMB 580 per tonne at the end November, yet it followed an overall upward trend compared to the first half of 2018. In the first half of 2018 (January to July), the bauxite price was between the range of RMB 380 per tonne and RMB 505 per tonne. However, the average prices on January 28 were expected to range between RMB...
Why buy "Aluminium Industry Recap 2018: A Look Back at the Global Aluminium Value Chain" report?
Aluminium has been the most talked-about non-ferrous metal in the year 2018 for many reasons. New tariffs, sanctions, trade wars on one hand; and developments and expansions on the other across the entire value chain emerged as non-avoidable circumstances in the year gone by. To start with, the temporary closure of Hydro’s Alunorte alumina refinery in Brazil and uncertainties surrounding U.S. sanctions on Rusal pushed up alumina price sky high driving the export market and boosting profits for integrated aluminium producers. Joining this, the levy of 25 per cent US tariffs on imported steel and 10 per cent on aluminium pushed the benchmark aluminium price on London Metal Exchange to its highest in almost 7 years at US$2602.5 per tonne in April 2018. Well, if the prices saw some...
India defers its retaliatory tariffs on American products yet again
According to The Financial Express report, India is likely to defer the levy of retaliatory tariffs to another 30 to 45 days from the revised deadline of January 31, 2019. This will be the fifth time that India would postpone its tit-for-tat duties worth close to US$235 million on 29 American products. New Delhi had initially planned to impose the retaliatory tariffs from August 4, 2018, but later on postponed to September 18, in a bid for the two nations to find a mutual solution. The Government then again deferred the deadline to November 2 and December 17. The Indian Government is repeatedly extending the tariffs deadline with an expectation to keep a tariff war between the two countries from flaring up, at least temporarily. Washington already raised the stake in its trade war against...
