UPDATE 1-Bankrupt aluminium maker ZALCO looks for buyer

Dutch primary aluminium producer ZALCO is looking for a buyer to restart its plant, which was shut on Friday due to lack of funds after the company filed for bankruptcy last week, an official receiver said.

The plant employed 500 people.

"The company filed for bankruptcy last Tuesday, and on Friday we decided to shut down the plant due to lack of funds; we couldn't pay the energy bills," Ernst Butterman, one of the two official receivers, told Reuters in a phone interview on Monday.

"We decided to have a controlled shutdown of the plant while looking for a buyer."

Last Wednesday the receivers held a meeting with the plant's electricity suppliers to try and keep the power supply going, but by Friday its funds were used up and the plant had to shut down, Butterman added.

The receivers are now hoping to find a buyer for the plant, which is based in Vlissingen, the Netherlands. It had produced about 230,000 tonnes of aluminium extrusion billets and rolling slabs per year.

The company also produced about 100,000 tonnes of anodes per year for its own processes and for third parties.

Zalco's production facilities include two furnaces for producing anodes, 512 electrolysis baths for making primary aluminium and two recycling furnaces, 10 preparation furnaces and four homogenisation furnaces for end products, according to its website.

ZALCO is owned by Geneva-based private industrial group Klesch.