The Alcan Lynemouth Aluminium Smelter is a mothballed industrial facility near

Ashington Ashington is a town and civil parish in Northumberland, England, with a population of 27,864 at the 2011 Census. It was once a centre of the coal mining industry. The town is north of Newcastle upon Tyne, west of the A189 and bordered to the ...

Northumberland Northumberland () is a county in Northern England, one of two counties in England which border with Scotland. Notable landmarks in the county include Alnwick Castle, Bamburgh Castle, Hadrian's Wall and Hexham Abbey. It is bordered by land on ...

, on the coast of

North East England North East England is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. The region has three current administrative levels below the region level in the region; combined authority, unitary authorit ...

, south of the village of

Lynemouth Lynemouth is a village in Northumberland, England, northeast of Ashington, close to the village of Ellington to the north west. It was built close to coal mines, including Lynemouth Colliery. Lynemouth and the surrounding industrial area feat ...

. The smelter is owned by the Canadian

aluminium Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. I ...

company

Alcan Alcan was a Canadian mining company and aluminum manufacturer. It was founded in 1902 as the Northern Aluminum Company, renamed Aluminum Company of Canada in 1925, and Alcan Aluminum in 1966. It took the name Alcan Incorporated in 2001. During t ...

, which is part of

Rio Tinto Rio Tinto, meaning "red river", may refer to: Businesses * Rio Tinto (corporation), an Anglo-Australian multinational mining and resources corporation ** Rio Tinto Alcan, based in Canada ** Rio Tinto Borax in America *** Rio Tinto Borax Mine, a ...

. The smelter was opened in 1974 at a cost, which exceeded its budgeted estimate of £54 million, of $156 million. The plant ceased production in March 2012.

Factors determining the smelter's site

A variety of factors determined the smelter's position: *The first was a source of

electric power Electric power is the rate at which electrical energy is transferred by an electric circuit. The SI unit of power is the watt, one joule per second. Standard prefixes apply to watts as with other SI units: thousands, millions and billions o ...

to smelt the

. One tonne of aluminium requires the same amount of electricity that an average family uses in 20 years, so cheap power was needed. In 1972, Alcan commissioned Lynemouth Power Station, less than from the smelter's site, to fulfil its power needs. The station's site was convenient for access to the Ellington and Lynemouth

coal mine Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...

s nearby, which were also the fundamental reason for the nearby village's creation. The power station has a 420

megawatt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units, International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), ...

(MW) capacity, more than enough to meet the load requirements of the smelter. The spare electricity is sold to the National Grid. *Another factor was finding a

labour force The workforce or labour force is a concept referring to the pool of human beings either in employment or in unemployment. It is generally used to describe those working for a single company or industry, but can also apply to a geographic regio ...

. Many coal mines in the area had shut down, leaving thousands of people there unemployed.

Aluminium smelting Aluminium smelting is the process of extracting aluminium from its oxide, alumina, generally by the Hall-Héroult process. Alumina is extracted from the ore bauxite by means of the Bayer process at an List of alumina refineries, alumina refinery. ...

is very labour-intensive, but the workforce in the local area was used to heavy work because of working in the mines. The British government also granted £28 million to the company to help reduce unemployment in the area. *

Transport Transport (in British English), or transportation (in American English), is the intentional movement of humans, animals, and goods from one location to another. Modes of transport include air, land (rail and road), water, cable, pipeline, an ...

was another major factor as

bauxite Bauxite is a sedimentary rock with a relatively high aluminium content. It is the world's main source of aluminium and gallium. Bauxite consists mostly of the aluminium minerals gibbsite (Al(OH)3), boehmite (γ-AlO(OH)) and diaspore (α-AlO(O ...

could not be found in the United Kingdom, only in places such as Jamaica and Australia. The smelter's location had to be near a port with good transport links to the site. The town of Blyth, which is south of the smelter, already had a deep sea port. There was also a

railway Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

link from the port going directly to the power station, which was connected to the Alcan facility. The site also has good road links.

Facts

* The smelter had two of the most efficient ring burners in the world, costing around £17 million each. * The smelter was the only aluminium smelting site in Europe which rebuilt the smelter whilst still in production. It was a 100-day process which took place every seven years. * The smelter was provided with alumina by two trains a day from Blyth, each consisting of 21 wagons. The alumina was shipped to Blyth from

Limerick Limerick ( ; ga, Luimneach ) is a western city in Ireland situated within County Limerick. It is in the province of Munster and is located in the Mid-West which comprises part of the Southern Region. With a population of 94,192 at the 2016 ...

in the

Republic of Ireland Ireland ( ga, Éire ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 counties of the island of Ireland. The capital and largest city is Dublin, on the eastern side of the island. A ...

. * Coke was shipped to Blyth from

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

in the U.S. and was transported to the smelter by heavy goods vehicles.

Worries

When work started on the site, local farmers were worried that pollution from the smelter would ruin their crops and harm their livestock. To address their concerns, Alcan decided to buy the land from them. Alcan now owns over of land in the local area and employs a farming director. The land is still used to grow crops and raise livestock. In early 2005, residents of nearby villages were worried about the fate of the smelter when the only remaining local coal mine, situated at Ellington, closed. However, the smelter did not close and imports its coal from overseas or from mines in other parts of the country. The emissions of the power plant connected to the smelter were another concern for the environment. In April 2010, the

European Court of Justice The European Court of Justice (ECJ, french: Cour de Justice européenne), formally just the Court of Justice, is the supreme court of the European Union in matters of European Union law. As a part of the Court of Justice of the European Un ...

decided that, contrary to the claim of the

UK government ga, Rialtas a Shoilse gd, Riaghaltas a Mhòrachd , image = HM Government logo.svg , image_size = 220px , image2 = Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom (HM Government).svg , image_size2 = 180px , caption = Royal Arms , date_es ...

, the power plant was subject to the emission limit values laid down in the 2001

Large Combustion Plant Directive The Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD, 2001/80/EC) was a European Union directive which required member states of the European Union to legislatively limit flue gas emissions from combustion plant having thermal capacity of 50 MW or grea ...

. As a consequence, emissions of air polluting substances of the plant had to be reduced.

Closure

Production at the Lynemouth Smelter ended at 14:00 on 29 March 2012, following a 90-day consultation period. It closed in May 2012 putting 515 people out of work and causing a knock-on effect in its local supply chain. Alcan cited rising energy costs due to emerging European environmental legislation as the reason. The 420MW coal power station continues to operate under new ownership. In June 2016, all eight chimneys at the site were demolished and the rest of the buildings are now rented to other businesses. It has now been repurposed as a biomass power plant. The area is now a wind farm site.

References

External links