Emirates Global heads into recycling era with profits

Emirates Global Aluminium (EGA) says it more than doubled its profits in the first half of 2022 compared with the prior year’s first half. The United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based producer of primary aluminum announced earlier in the year that it is building its first scrap-fed aluminum furnace in Dubai, UAE, with that project underway.

The company’s announced 150,000 metric tons per year recycling line will have ambitious profit margins to match EGA’s primary production, based on its most recent results.

In the first half of 2022, EGA says it earned $2.1 billion in adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), which compare with $950 million earned in the first half of 2021.

EGA says its sales volume of cast aluminum increased by 11 per cent to 1.31 million metric tons in the first half of this year, compared with 1.18 million metric tons made in the first half of 2021,

The longtime primary aluminum producer announced in February that it plans to build a 150,000 metric tons per year aluminum recycling facility, which will be EGA’s first and will be the largest such secondary melt shop in the UAE, according to the firm. EGA says it intends to market recycled-content aluminum under the product name EternAL.

The facility “will process postconsumer aluminum scrap such as used window frames, as well as preconsumer aluminum scrap from extrusion production, into low-carbon, high quality aluminum billets,” EGA says.

The company says aluminum scrap for the furnaces will “mainly be sourced from the UAE and the wider region.” EGA says more than half the aluminum scrap generated in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region “is currently either disposed of or exported.”

CEO Abdulnasser Bin Kalban says, “End users of aluminum—from auto manufacturers to beverage makers—are increasingly committing to net zero in response to the expectations of society. This, our first recycling facility at EGA to produce EternAL [recycled content billets] is one of the steps we plan to take to provide low-carbon metal for our customers around the world.”

Bin Kalban continues, “This facility will also strengthen EGA’s position as global leader in billet production, growing our capacity from some 1.15 million metric tons per year to some 1.3 million metric tons amid ever-increasing demand from our customers for this value-added product.”

EGA says production ramp-up at the scrap-fed melt shop could begin as early as 2024.