OREANDA-NEWS. RUSAL, a top-three global aluminium company, announces the launch of the first starter complex of the Khakas Aluminium Smelter (KhAZ).

According to the press service of RUSAL, the smelter is the first aluminium production facility in Russia built in the past 20 years. Total investments into the project exceeded USD 750 million.

The smelter is located in the Republic of Khakasia. It operates using modern dry-anode technology and is fitted with RA-300 reduction cells designed by specialists at RUSAL's Engineering and Technology Centre. It is considered one of the world's top-three technologies in the aluminium industry. The capacity of the smelter is 300,000 million tonnes per year, which will bring up RUSAL's primary aluminium production by 11%. The annual capacity of the first starter complex is 71,000 million tonnes.

"The smelter was constructed using state-of-the-art equipment and technologies. Thus we created a facility meeting the most stringent international standards in the areas of production, environment, and labour safety", said Alexander Bulygin, CEO of RUSAL.

The smelter comprises reduction, anode and cast shops as well as infrastructure and electricity distribution facilities. The production processes are operated by automated management systems that allow for the efficient regulation of technological operations, non-stop monitoring of the work of reduction cells, dry scrubbers, casting equipment, and anode production.

The smelter was constructed in a very short period of time. It took 25 months to go from the initial design stage to the completion of the first starter complex. The total completion of the smelter is planned for November 2007. The project was carried out by Russian developers, with RUSAL's All-Russia Aluminium and Magnesium Institute (VAMI) being the principal designer.

The project involved around 250 Russian and more than 40 international producers and suppliers of equipment and materials. Aside from RUSAL's own designs, the new smelter uses best international engineering solutions from leading aluminium industry suppliers such as ARENA, ALSTOM, Hencon, NKM Noell, Brochot and others. Investment into the purchasing of equipment amounted to USD 200 million, In realizing the project 3 joint ventures were established and 5 foreign companies started their operations.

The overall investment into the regional infrastructure equaled more than USD 21 million. The launch of the new production facility has created around 1000 jobs in the Republic of Khakasia.