Alcan Lynemouth Aluminium Smelter
Encyclopedia
The Alcan Lynemouth Aluminium Smelter is situated near Ashington, Northumberland
, on the coast of North East England
, 0.65 mi (1 km) south of the village of Lynemouth
. The smelter is owned by Canadian
aluminium
company Alcan
, which is part of Rio Tinto
. The smelter was opened in 1974 at a cost of £54 million.
In early 2005 residents of nearby villages were worried about the fate of the smelter when the only remaining local coal mine situated at Ellington
, closed. However the smelter did not close and imports its coal from overseas or from mines in other parts of the country.
The emissions of the power plant connected to the smelter were another concern for the environment. In April 2010, the European Court of Justice
decided http://curia.europa.eu/jurisp/cgi-bin/form.pl?lang=en&Submit=Submit&docrequire=alldocs&numaff=c-346/08 that, in contrary to the claim of the UK Government, the power plant was subject to the emission limit values laid down in the 2001 directive on large combustion plants (2001/80/EC)http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001L0080:EN:HTML. As a consequence, emissions of air polluting substances of the plant should now be reduced.
Northumberland
Northumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...
, on the coast of North East England
North East England
North East England is one of the nine official regions of England. It covers Northumberland, County Durham, Tyne and Wear, and Teesside . The only cities in the region are Durham, Newcastle upon Tyne and Sunderland...
, 0.65 mi (1 km) south of the village of Lynemouth
Lynemouth
Lynemouth is a village in Northumberland, England. The village is situated northeast of Ashington, and is in close proximity to the village of Ellington which is located to the north west...
. The smelter is owned by Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
aluminium
Aluminium
Aluminium or aluminum is a silvery white member of the boron group of chemical elements. It has the symbol Al, and its atomic number is 13. It is not soluble in water under normal circumstances....
company Alcan
Alcan
Rio Tinto Alcan Inc. is a Canadian company based in Montreal. It was created on November 15, 2007 as the result of the merger between Rio Tinto PLC's Canadian subsidiary, Rio Tinto Canada Holding Inc., and Canadian company Alcan Inc. On the same date, Alcan Inc. was renamed Rio Tinto Alcan Inc..Rio...
, which is part of Rio Tinto
Rio Tinto Group
The Rio Tinto Group is a diversified, British-Australian, multinational mining and resources group with headquarters in London and Melbourne. The company was founded in 1873, when a multinational consortium of investors purchased a mine complex on the Rio Tinto river, in Huelva, Spain from the...
. The smelter was opened in 1974 at a cost of £54 million.
Factors Determining the Smelter's Site
A variety of factors determined the smelter's position:- The first was a source of electric powerElectric powerElectric power is the rate at which electric energy is transferred by an electric circuit. The SI unit of power is the watt.-Circuits:Electric power, like mechanical power, is represented by the letter P in electrical equations...
to smelt the aluminiumAluminiumAluminium or aluminum is a silvery white member of the boron group of chemical elements. It has the symbol Al, and its atomic number is 13. It is not soluble in water under normal circumstances....
. One tonne of aluminium requires the same amount of electricity that an average family uses in 20 years, so cheap power was needed. In 1972 Alcan commissioned Lynemouth Power StationLynemouth Power StationAlcan Lynemouth Power Station is a coal and biomass fired power station which provides electricity for the Alcan Lynemouth Aluminium Smelter and the National Grid. It is located on the coast of Northumberland, north east of the town of Ashington in North East England...
less than 200 m (656.2 ft) from the smelter's site, to fulfil its power needs. The station's site was convenient for access to the Ellington and Lynemouth coal mines nearby, which were also the fundamental reason for the nearby village's creation. The power station has a 420 megawattWattThe watt is a derived unit of power in the International System of Units , named after the Scottish engineer James Watt . The unit, defined as one joule per second, measures the rate of energy conversion.-Definition:...
(MW) capacity, more than enough to meet the load requirements of the smelter. The spare electricity is sold to the National Grid.
- Another factor was finding a labour force. Many coal mines in the area had shut down, leaving thousands of people there unemployed. Aluminium smeltingAluminium smeltingAluminium smelting is the process of extracting aluminium from its oxide alumina, generally by the Hall-Héroult process. Alumina is extracted from the ore Bauxite by means of the Bayer process at an alumina refinery....
is very labour-intensive, but the workforce in the local area were used to heavy work because of working in the mines. The BritishUnited KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
government also granted £28 million to the company to help reduce unemployment in the area.
- TransportTransportTransport or transportation is the movement of people, cattle, animals and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, rail, road, water, cable, pipeline, and space. The field can be divided into infrastructure, vehicles, and operations...
was another major factor as bauxiteBauxiteBauxite is an aluminium ore and is the main source of aluminium. This form of rock consists mostly of the minerals gibbsite Al3, boehmite γ-AlO, and diaspore α-AlO, in a mixture with the two iron oxides goethite and hematite, the clay mineral kaolinite, and small amounts of anatase TiO2...
could not be found in the United Kingdom, only in places such as JamaicaJamaicaJamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
and AustraliaAustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. The smelter's location had to be near a port with good transport links to the site. The town of BlythBlyth, NorthumberlandBlyth is a town and civil parish in southeast Northumberland, England. It lies on the coast, to the south of the River Blyth and is approximately 21 kilometres northeast of Newcastle upon Tyne...
, which is 4 mi (6.4 km) south of the smelter, already had a deep sea port. There was also a railway link from the port going directly to the power station, which was connected to the Alcan facility. The site also has good road links.
Facts
- The smelter has two of the most efficient ring burners in the world, costing around £17 million each.
- The smelter is the only aluminium smelting site in EuropeEuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
which rebuilds the smelter whilst still in production. It is a 100 day process which takes place every seven years.
- The smelter is provided with alumina by two trains a day from Blyth, each consisting of 21 waggons. The alumina is shipped to Blyth from LimerickLimerickLimerick is the third largest city in the Republic of Ireland, and the principal city of County Limerick and Ireland's Mid-West Region. It is the fifth most populous city in all of Ireland. When taking the extra-municipal suburbs into account, Limerick is the third largest conurbation in the...
in the Republic of IrelandRepublic of IrelandIreland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...
.
- CokeCoke (fuel)Coke is the solid carbonaceous material derived from destructive distillation of low-ash, low-sulfur bituminous coal. Cokes from coal are grey, hard, and porous. While coke can be formed naturally, the commonly used form is man-made.- History :...
is shipped to Blyth from LouisianaLouisianaLouisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
in the U.S. and is transported to the smelter by HGVHGVHGV may mean:*Heavy Goods Vehicle - the old legal term in the United Kingdom for goods vehicles over 3.5 tonnes Gross Vehicle Weight*Hepatitis G virus, another name of GB virus C*Histology Group of Victoria Incorporated...
s.
Worries
When work first started on the site local farmers were worried that pollution from the smelter would ruin their crops and harm their livestock. To address their concerns Alcan decided to buy the land from them. Alcan now own over 4500 acres (18.2 km²) of land in the local area and employ a farming director. The land is still used to grow crops and raise livestock.In early 2005 residents of nearby villages were worried about the fate of the smelter when the only remaining local coal mine situated at Ellington
Ellington, Northumberland
Ellington is a small village on the coast of Northumberland, England. Ellington is four miles from Ashington, six miles from Morpeth and twenty miles north of Newcastle upon Tyne....
, closed. However the smelter did not close and imports its coal from overseas or from mines in other parts of the country.
The emissions of the power plant connected to the smelter were another concern for the environment. In April 2010, the European Court of Justice
European Court of Justice
The Court can sit in plenary session, as a Grand Chamber of 13 judges, or in chambers of three or five judges. Plenary sitting are now very rare, and the court mostly sits in chambers of three or five judges...
decided http://curia.europa.eu/jurisp/cgi-bin/form.pl?lang=en&Submit=Submit&docrequire=alldocs&numaff=c-346/08 that, in contrary to the claim of the UK Government, the power plant was subject to the emission limit values laid down in the 2001 directive on large combustion plants (2001/80/EC)http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32001L0080:EN:HTML. As a consequence, emissions of air polluting substances of the plant should now be reduced.