There was further good news for the company’s Casting Operations, which produced more than 1Mt of finished aluminium products for the second consecutive year.
“These production milestones are the culmination of a calculated strategy, driven by an ambitious corporate vision to rank among the world’s top five primary aluminium producers,” said Abdulla Kalban, Dubal President & CEO.
“Since the commissioning of our operations in 1979, Dubal has completed a series of expansion projects. This has resulted in the number of aluminium reduction cells in our Jebel Ali plant (pictured above) increasing more than three-fold, from 360 pots to 1573 pots; and our company’s production rising more than seven-fold over the years from 135kt/y at inception to 1, 002, 414Mt/y in 2010.”
Kalban added that the company’s annual production volumes have consistently exceeded design specifications. “By using advanced in-house developed technologies, which offer improved productivity and other operating benefits, and simultaneously maximising ‘creep’ through technical and operational improvements to our existing facilities, we have effectively increased our production capacity,” he said.
“This, together with higher amperage levels and overall efficiency improvements, has resulted in compound annual growth in our hot metal production of more than 9.8% since 1995. Ever-higher hot metal production is going forward, driven by further productivity gains.”
The improved productivity, capacity and efficiency of Dubal’s operations has been achieved while maintaining the highest standards of environmental conservation —particularly reduced energy consumption and emissions.
“In 2010, the specific energy consumption of our DX Technology pots was less than 13.05kWh/kg aluminium — which is very favourably against the world average of 15.8kWh/kg aluminium1 for our industry,” said Kalban.
“Perfluorocarbon emissions from our DX Technology cells were contained at 0.008CO2eqmt/mt aluminium, which is far lower than the industry average of 0.27CO2eq/mt aluminium1.
"Likewise, the total fluoride emission level from our Jebel Ali plant was just 0.63kg/mt aluminium, compared to the industry average of 1.12kg/mt aluminium1. These performance standards will be sustained, if not bettered, in the year ahead.”
Dubal is a wholly government owned, UAE-based primary aluminium producer and is home to one of the world’s largest single-site smelters in terms of annual capacity.
[1]International Aluminium Institute
