Rusal spends $500,000 monthly to maintain ALSCON

The management of the Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria (ALSCON) says it spends $500,000 (about N10 million) monthly to maintain facilities and equipment at its factory located in Ikot Abasi local government area of Akwa Ibom State since it took over the plant in 2007.

It adds that more than $130 million has been invested in the smelter to modernise facilities beginning from 2007 when the company began operations.

In an exclusive interview with Businessday in this office at Ikot Abasi, the company’s Managing Director, Zaviyalov Dmitry said while the plant was in operation, it suffered many disruptions in gas supply which he said resulted in partial and later full suspension of operations adding that the company incurred huge losses running into millions of US Dollars on remedial works and recovery of production process.

He however added that Rusal, the Russian firm running the plant was in talks with the new administration in the country with a view to restarting the plant.

“We are currently in talks with the government in Nigeria for possible supply of gas to the plant. This is the key issue for ALSCON to restart production,’’ Dmitry said.

Identifying constant power supply as key to the company returning to production, he said the management was constrained to shut down the plant in 2013 due to gas supply interruptions, security as well as legal challenges adding that the since then the plant has remained idle.

“At present, the company is conducting Nigerian market survey research. We are studying the volume of aluminium goods consumed, evaluating new demand and opportunities to produce and distribute not only in the primary aluminium but also value added products such as wire rod for the manufacture of overhead power lines, cables of different kinds and aluminium profiles,’’ he said.

He expressed the hope that the new administration in the country “will see reasons with us and constructively help us in resolving the issues and equally support our operations here in Nigeria’’ adding that if the challenges were resolved “together with our Nigerian partners, we can restart the plant and by so doing render our contributions to the growth of the Nigerian economy.’’

Dmitry described the medium term economic outlook for Nigeria as being good saying that the demand for aluminium would continue to grow while the country would constantly face a shortage of aluminium on the domestic market.

According to him, the company has plans to sell more primary aluminium to Nigerian manufacturing companies and described ALSCON as part of the company’s strategic assets having the image of Nigeria on the international aluminium market.

He solicited the support of the government in addressing the challenges facing the plant adding that the management has prepared a long term development plan for ALSCON but stressed that without the support of the “government we might not be able to restart the plant.’’

ALSCON, the only smelter plant in the country was over by Rusal in 2007 but was shut down due to ‘’numerous disruptions in gas supply.’’

Copyright and Exemption Declaration :¢ÙAll articles, pictures and videos that are marked with "China Aluminum Network" on this website are copyright and belong to China Aluminium Network (www.alu.com.cn). When transshipment, any media, website or individual must list the source from "China Aluminium Network (www.alu.com.cn)". We seek legal actions against anyone that disobey this. ¢ÚArticles that marked as copy from others are for transferring more information to readers, do not represent or endorse their opinions or accuracy and reliability. When other media, website or individuals copy from our website, must keep the source. Anyone that changes the articles' sources will hold the responsibilities for copyright and law problems. We also seek legal actions against anyone that disobey this. ¢ÛIf any articles copied by our website concern the copyright and other problems, please contact us within one week.