Aluminium heavyweights step up to the challenge

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Aluminium Bahrain (Alba)

Gulf Aluminium Rolling Mill Co. (Garmco)

The company was formed in 1981 following a decree issued by HH the late Emir of Bahrain, Sheikh Isa Bin Salman Al Khalifa, and undertaken with the governments of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman and Qatar.

The plant was constructed by Kaiser Engineering, USA. The machinery was installed by Kobe Steel of Japan who also undertook the start-up operation and the training of local staff at one of its aluminium plants in Japan.

Garmco produced its first 20,000 tonnes of rolled aluminium in 1986, while today, the company is the largest downstream aluminium facility in the Gulf region, complementing the success of its close neighbour, Alba.

The original Garmco facility had an annual capacity of 40,000 tonnes. Through equipment enhancement, this increased to 70,000 tonnes by 1990. Garmco then invested in a second cold-rolling mill and related facilities, resulting in the current annual capacity of 125,000 tonnes.

A further update of the facilities was carried out in 2004 to raise this to 145,000 and in 2005, more fine tuning on existing equipment resulted in an annual capacity of 165,000 tonnes.

Emirates Aluminium (Emal)

Emal was created through a joint development agreement signed between Dubal and the Mubadala Development Company in Abu Dhabi in February 2007. When operational, it will be the largest single aluminium smelter in the world. The first of the two-phase project will be operational by 2010 with 700,000TPA capacity. The second phase of the smelter will produce a further 700,000TPA at an approximate cost of $3 billion. The complex, which will be at the 6km² Khalifa Port and Industrial Zone in Taweelah, Abu Dhabi, will have a total of 1.4 million TPA capacity on completion of both the phases.

When full capacity is reached in 2013, the smelter is expected to produce one third of the GCC's forecasted demand when full capacity is reached in 2013.

Groundbreaking was carried out 31 May 2007. At the ceremony, the company announced the awarding of the engineering, procurement, construction and management contract for the smelter project to a joint venture comprised of Canada's SNC-Lavalin and Australia's WorleyParsons. The total value of the contract is approximately $300 million.

Reem Emirates Aluminium

Reem Emirates Aluminium was set up to capitalise on the burgeoning growth of Abu Dhabi, and especially the growing demand for architectural finishes and metal works in the capital. A new state-of-the-art factory built in Mussafah on a 70,000m² plot is due to open in late 2007 or early 2008.

When up and running, the factory will be the largest in the UAE, with a production capacity of 400 panels per day, which equates to approximately 2,000m². It will provide custom made architectural cladding elements with particular emphasis on designing and manufacturing unitised curtain wall panels.

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