Earlier this week Romanian aluminium company Alro SA announced the launch of a US$53 million investment plan for this fiscal year. The firm intends to use the investment to focus on increasing its energy and equipment efficiency, expanding its portfolio, increasing competitiveness, and boosting product quality.
“Alro has a constant strategy for reducing energy consumption, in order to preserve the operational efficiency on a highly competitive international market,” said Alro’s General Manager Gheorghe Dobra. “The investments we have made, both in equipment and in research and development have enabled us to achieve one of the highest levels of energy efficiency in the aluminium industry. Under these circumstances, the solution to further reduce energy consumption consisted in investing in a facility for recycling of aluminium scrap, whose capacity we plan to expand this year.”
Alro’s investment plan includes expanding capacity at its scrap processing plant Eco Cast House to 90,000 metric tons per year, and to increase the plant’s energy efficiency along the way. Most of the increase in capacity will occur with the installation of a new 60,000 metric ton scrap processing line.
The firm says Eco Cast House has already made a significant contribution to the sector’s energy efficiency. The station has been providing liquid aluminium from alternative sources to electrolysis, which is a method that uses a significant amount of energy. According to a study published last year by the EU’s Joint Research Center, Alro’s investments over the previous decade have brought the plant to 99% of its maximum possible efficiency, and this with one more stage in the optimization process remaining.
Alro was founded in 1963 and is based in Slatina, Romania. The firm, a subsidiary of Vimetco N.V., has an installed capacity of 265,000 metric tons per year, making it one of the largest producers in Central and Eastern Europe.