Rio Tinto announces 6% QoQ decline in bauxite production to 13.1 MT in 4Q2021; Aluminium output slips 2% to 757,000 tonnes

On Wednesday, February 2, Rio Tinto announced its fourth-quarter and full-year 2021 report, revealing the bauxite output in Q4 at 13.1 million tonnes, down by 6 per cent quarter-on-quarter and 2 per cent year-on-year. In the entire year, the company’s bauxite production came in at 54.3 million tonnes, 3 per cent less than in 2020, due to severe wet weather in the first quarter impacting system stability throughout the year, equipment reliability issues and overruns on planned shutdowns at our Pacific operations.

Rio Tinto also declared that its aluminium output in 4Q2021 stood at 757,000 tonnes, 2 per cent less than in 3Q2021 and 7 per cent than in 4Q2020. Full-year production was 3.151 million tonnes, slightly down by 1 per cent than in the previous year. Reduced capacity at Rio’s Kitimat smelter in British Columbia, following strike from July 2021 could be reason for the fall in aluminium output, both in Q4 and full-year.

The company’s alumina production totalled 1.91 million tonnes in Q4 2021, which was 1 per cent less Q-o-Q and 8 per cent lower than in Q4 2020. Output in the full-year amounted to 7.894 million tonnes, down by 2 per cent from 2020, as a result of outages during the year at the Yarwun refinery in Queensland, Australia and at Vaudreuil refinery in Quebec, Canada.

Rio Tinto Chief Executive Jakob Stausholm, said: “In 2021 we continued to experience strong demand for our products while operating conditions remained challenging, including due to prolonged COVID-19 disruptions. Despite this, we progressed a number of our projects, including the Pilbara replacement mines, underlining the resilience of the business and the commitment and flexibility of our people, communities and host governments. We are seeing some initial positive results from the implementation of the Rio Tinto Safe Production System, which we will significantly ramp up in 2022, as we continue to work hard to improve our operational performance to become the best operator.”

Rio mentioned in the production report that it entered into several partnerships to accelerate decarbonising own business and the value chains it operates in. In November, Rio announced the ELYSIS joint venture successfully produced aluminium without any direct greenhouse gas emissions from commercial-size cells.

For 2022, Rio Tinto expects its bauxite production to come in at 54 to 57 million tonnes and alumina output to stand at 8 to 8.4 million tonnes. Aluminium output is estimated to amount to 3.1 to 3.2 million tonnes.