Rio Tinto has just announced that it will wind down New Zealand Aluminium Smelters, best known as Tiwai Point smelter.Tiwai Point. Photo: 123rf
In a statement to the Australian Stock Exchange, the company said its strategic review had "shown the business is no
longer viable given high energy costs and a challenging outlook for the aluminium industry."
The company has given Meridian Energy notice to terminate its power contract, which ends in August next year. It expects
the wind-down of operations will be done by then.
It said it had had discussions with interested parties but could not secure a power contract that would have kept the
smelter competitive and profitable.
The smelter's viability has been questioned for much of the past decade as it grappled with weak metal prices, power
costs, and over capacity which has seen smelters closed around the world.
NZ Aluminium Smelters chief executive Stu Hamilton told Morning Report they were on a path to winding down operations.
"We don't think there's a deal that can be done that will deliver competitively priced power to the smelter which is
necessary for it to be sustainable.
"We do believe that nothing has been left on the table but if we're mistaken then the window is still available for a
deal to be put on the table but the window for that is closing fast now that we have terminated our electricity contract
with Meridian.
"This is a very serious situation."
We've got a thousand Southland people, good Southland people, who have been walking through our gates every day to
produce some of the highest purity ... aluminium in the world and it's extremely disappointing that we couldn't have
achieved an outcome that will let us continue to keep operating."
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Hamilton said they would be not be making decisions on jobs until the first half of next year.
Last year it announced a $46m loss, with Hamilton saying at the time it had been hit by a 15 percent fall in global prices, but most notably from high
power and transmission costs. "No matter how hard or efficiently the team here works, we can't consistently offset the
high price of power and transmission charges we face," Hamilton said.
Recently, there has been even more pressure on aluminium supplies globally with the slow down or collapse of
aluminium-intensive industries like car manufacturing, aeroplane and aerospace production, due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Rio Tinto Aluminium chief executive Alf Barrios said the wind-down "will have a significant impact" on workers and the
community.
"It is not a decision we have made lightly and without significant careful consideration."
The smelter is New Zealand's largest power consumer, using around 12 percent of the country's electricity
It employs about 1000 people directly and creates a further 1600 indirect jobs in Southland.
When the smelter was placed under review last October, Meridian dubbed the possibility of closure "Smexit", a conflation
of smelter and Brexit.
The smelter is owned by Rio Tinto and Japan's Sumitomo Chemical Co. It reported an underlying net loss of NZ$46 million
($29 million) for 2019, down from a net profit of NZ$22 million the previous year.Dispute over hazardous waste
The smelter company is also embroiled in a dispute over some 10,000 tonnes potentially toxic ouvea premix wasted stored
a disused paper mill in Mataura.
The Environmental Defence Society has filed court proceedings against New Zealand Aluminium Smelters, asking the court
to decide who had responsibility under the Resource Management Act.
While New Zealand Aluminium Smelters contracted Taha Asia Pacific to take care of the waste product in 2011, the
Environmental Defence Society was arguing that contract - and Taha's subsequent liquidation - should not absolve the
smelter of responsibility.
The ouvea premix - a by-product of production at Tiwai Point facility - was dumped at the mill without resource consent
in 2015 by Taha Asia Pacific.
Taha went into liquidation the following year and the waste sat there until March 2018, when government and local
councils agreed to a $4 million deal with New Zealand Aluminium Smelters to remove and dispose of the waste over six
years.