LME Aluminum Inventory Declines 0.31% to 241,400 mt on September 23

[SMM Aluminum Express News] METLEN Energy & Metals will invest nearly €25 million in its EP.AL.ME. recycled aluminum operation in Greece, installing highly automated sorting, processing and melting equipment. The upgrade will allow EP.AL.ME., Greece’s largest independent recycled aluminum producer, to process more complex scrap streams, particularly post-consumer scrap recovered from end-of-life products that has previously been difficult to incorporate efficiently. The investment will more closely integrate EP.AL.ME. with METLEN’s Aluminium of Greece primary aluminum plant, with combined production expected to exceed 250,000 tonnes once the project is fully developed. EP.AL.ME. will act as the collection, sorting and scrap pre-processing hub, while Aluminium of Greece will incorporate recycled metal into higher-value aluminum products. METLEN said the integration should also improve margins at both operations.

[SMM Aluminum Express News] Azerbaijan is exploring a separate new primary aluminum smelter with capacity of around 200,000 tonnes/year, Economy Minister Mikayil Jabbarov said at a September 22 meeting chaired by President Ilham Aliyev. The project has attracted interest from foreign investors and forms part of Azerbaijan’s longer-term ambition to develop into a regional processing hub, supported by competitive energy prices, transport links and access to raw materials from Central Asia and the South Caucasus. The proposed 200,000 t/y smelter is separate from Azeraluminium’s existing expansion in Ganja, where electrolysis capacity is planned to increase from around 50,000 t/y to 100,000 t/y by 2030. Azerbaijan will also assess whether the Zaylik alunite deposit can provide a domestic raw-material base for the aluminum value chain. The 2027-2030 mining and metallurgy programme requires an estimated AZN 5.3 billion (US$3.12 billion) of investment, around 80% of which is expected from non-budget sources.

[SMM Aluminum Express News] Azerbaijan plans to double Azeraluminium’s primary aluminium capacity at its Ganja electrolysis plant from around 50,000 tonnes/year to 100,000 tonnes/year by 2030. The expansion is included in the country’s newly approved 2027–2030 State Program for the Development of Mining and Metallurgical Industries, which also targets 50,000 tonnes/year of rolled aluminium capacity. President Ilham Aliyev said the aluminium expansion should be completed by the end of 2030