Emirates Global Aluminium (EGA), the largest industrial company in the United Arab Emirates outside oil and gas, has announced that the next generation of its process technology has reached the final feasibility stage.
The new technology is expected to push the boundaries of what is possible in the global aluminium industry, improving productivity and energy efficiency, and reducing environmental emissions and construction costs. Design and detailed engineering work has already been completed by the EGA technology team.
EGA has focused on technology development for over 25 years, continuously improving its core aluminium smelting process. The new technology is the tenth generation EGA technology.
In 2016 EGA became the first UAE industrial company to licence its core industrial process technology internationally, in a major milestone in the UAE’s drive to develop a knowledge-based economy.
EGA’s technology was licensed to Aluminium Bahrain following a globally-competitive tendering process.
Abdulla Kalban, EGA’s Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, said: “Continuously improving our technologies over decades has been fundamental to EGA’s commercial success and environmental performance. Technology is now also a revenue stream for EGA. There is a lot more work for our technology team to do, but we look forward to EGA’s new technology being a success at our own smelters in Abu Dhabi and Dubai and with our technology customers.”
The feasibility study will test the engineering viability and construction cost assumptions of the new technology, and is being conducted by SNC-Lavalin. Success in the feasibility stage will be the green light for EGA to build pilot pots using the new technology at its Al Taweelah aluminium smelter.
EGA’s technology development team has been working on the new generation technology for the past 16 months.
That technology, called DX+ Ultra, has more than double the productivity of the company’s original D18 technology developed in 1992. Energy consumed during the smelting process with DX+ Ultra is already amongst the lowest in the global aluminium industry.
