Posted on 06/24/2022 10:30:24 AM PDT by Phoenix8
A large aluminum plant in Kentucky is temporarily halting production and laying off more than 600 workers due to rising energy costs. Century Aluminum has announced plans to shut down its Hawesville smelter for nine to 12 months starting in August. The plant, with about 628 workers, is the second-largest employer in Hancock County, the Owensboro Messenger-Inquirer reported. The county's judge-executive, Johnny Roberts, told the newspaper the company gave him no assurances the plant would reopen after that. Roberts said the company told him that its power costs have risen dramatically this year. Century Aluminum said the Hawesville plant is its largest "U.S. smelter and the largest producer of high purity primary aluminum in North America." The plant along the Ohio River had recently increased production and in April announced an addition of 60 jobs. "We celebrated that," said Andy Meserve, president of United Steelworkers Local 9423. "I guess if it hadn’t been for the cost of power, we would still be rocking and rolling." Employees learned of the pending layoffs on Wednesday.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I wonder if this is a blip or another sign of a very significant recession approaching?
Is this where they produce a form of aluminum for military applications?
It certainly points to the reality that energy costs are a major burden for many companies.
Smelted aluminum is expensive in terms of electricity used to melt it and form it.
Its one reason why the most successful recycling program is for aluminum - it is frozen electricity.
Will it reopen?
Not with current baseline electrical costs.
Going to hit us all. Democrat policies suck.
I don’t know, could ask my son in laws mom next time I see her.
Please do.
It would effect potential military readiness.
Especially since we’re giving Ukraine all our stuff.
Is Atlas Shrugging?
The Brandon Administration! Sacrificing jobs for “climate change”. I thought the liberals said they wanted to change the climate.
Klaus Schwab already told us the answer to that question.
You beat me to it. +1
You’ve nailed it. Not quite the same dynamics, but the same damage.
President Retard did that - screw up America better 🤪
Haha good 1 and I think he is.
In 2002, there were over 20 aluminum smelters in the USA. With the closure of this plant (and I do not expect it to reopen), I believe there are now just 3.
It will reopen when the US and Canada supply of AL ingots gets low, causing the wholesale prices to rise, it currently is at a 3 year low. The miners and refiners turn on and off very quickly, they are very dependant on D. and Electrical costs.
For aircraft grade AL, Ti, Magnesium, Colbalt , the supply is nearly closed loop, despite all the press, reclaimed aircraft scraps are used to make new aircraft. Regans 500 ship navy is the source of a good amount of the scrap for current US shipyards. There are piles and piles of ingots ready for the DOD to order to ship yards and aircraft plants if a bigger than the gulf wars effort ever emerges.
The consumption of AL cans is 80 times larger than it is for AL auto and truck parts. We have about 5 years of AL can backlog for the reprocessors to get through.
Someone posted in another thread that AL foil in grociery stores had doubled, while the spot price of the grade of AL in foil has dropped $2900/ton to $2600/ton since Jan 1 2022. The news and the daily sales seems to drive prices more than raw costs anymore. There is more cost in the box and moving the contained box than the contents.
For this plants workers, it is not unexpected. There is an abundance of skilled positions in the region that they can fill assuming alien worker are exported back to lands they come from.
The mini mills, the electric arc powered ones, have been running only late night shifts this summer unless they are on a grid with stable excess baselines...The mills in OH, MI, IN, IL, MO seem to all be still going full bore. The clasical mills powered by coal are verticaly intergrated and are playing the game over decades. They also have piles and piles of Iron and Steel products to ship as soon as someone can get the ship or truck into the loading dock.
Not with current baseline electrical costs.
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The problem is that the plant thought they could make more money by buying electricity on the wholesale market... that decision was made in 2014 and so far it has worked out fine for them, until this past year.
The article was posted yesterday... see this links for the comments about this.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/4073271/posts
May throw a kink in the Navy’s shipbuilding plans - the company made military grade aluminum.
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