Century Aluminum chief Michael Bless fights for Berkeley plant jobs

A Century Aluminum employee prepares a pot on line two for tapping. A Century Aluminum employee prepares a pot on line two for tapping. BRAD NETTLES/STAFF

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Just days before Century Aluminum’s Mount Holly smelter was due to shut down, probably for good, Michael Bless was still working to strike a deal that would save at least some of the 35-year-old plant’s 600 jobs and nearly $1 billion in annual economic impact.

“We’re pulling every lever we can,” Bless, Century’s president and CEO, said of his last-minute negotiations with state lawmakers on a plan to keep Mount Holly open.

A day later, Bless announced that the smelter would operate at 50 percent capacity through the first half of 2016 while the Legislature worked to let his company buy electricity on the open market.

Making aluminum takes a lot of electricity — about $150 million worth a year at the Mount Holly plant. As the company’s contract with Moncks Corner-based electric utility Santee Cooper was to expire at year’s end, Bless wanted to start the new year buying all of Mount Holly’s power on the open market. Santee Cooper officials refused, saying the proposal would raise rates for its other industrial customers. The two sides were deadlocked for months.

Then, in mid-December — as the first of Mount Holly’s two pot lines was shut down, leading to layoffs for half of the plant’s workers — Bless and local politicians forged their agreement. Mount Holly would continue to buy some of its power from Santee Cooper for the next six months until a new law, passed during the upcoming legislative session, gave Century the right to buy power from the cheapest source available.

The agreement saved 300 jobs from the outset, and Bless said he plans to bring back the rest of Mount Holly’s workers as the plant ramps up to full capacity through 2016.

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