Alcoa World Alumina and Chemicals (AWAC) has secured its first major third party contract to supply around 400,000 bone dry metric tonnes (bdmt) of bauxite from its Huntly mine in Western Australia.
This comes after the company’s first trial bauxite shipment from WA to China in mid 2016, introducing their WA product to the global market.
The agreement is part of the company’s strategy to grow its third party bauxite business. It also follows the WA state government’s approval for Alcoa to export up to 2.5 million metric tonnes per annum of bauxite for five years to third party customers.
“Bauxite exports have the potential to generate greater value from our WA mineral lease, creating additional revenue streams for Alcoa and the state of Western Australia, while maintaining supply to our three WA refineries,” Garret Dixon, president of Alcoa Bauxite said.
The WA contract is one of three bauxite agreements the company recently signed worth $US126 million, to deliver approximately 2.2 million bdmt of bauxite from its two mines in Brazil – Juruti and Mineração Rio do Norte.
The contracts increase the total value of Alcoa’s 2016 and 2017 third-party bauxite supply agreements to nearly $US600 million.
Alcoa is the world’s largest bauxite miner with 45.3 million bdmt of production in 2015.
It predicts the third-party bauxite demand will double between 2015 and 2024, with China as the biggest importer.