Aluminium Bahrain (Alba), one of the largest aluminium producers in the world, last month marked the handover of the remaining pots under the Alba Potline 6 expansion project in the presence of Alba chairman of board of directors Shaikh Daij bin Salman bin Daij Al Khalifa. Shaikh Daij also inspected the Line 6 construction which is in its final stages.

With the first hot metal from Potline 6 achieved on December 13 last year, Alba is now amongst the one-million-tonne smelters in the world.

It is one of the biggest brownfield developments in the Middle East region. Upon completion this year, the Line 6 Expansion Project will boost Alba’s per-annum production by 540,000 tonnes, bringing its total production capacity to 1.5 million tonnes per year.

With a Capex of $3 billion, the project involves the construction of a sixth pot line using EGA’s proprietary DX+ Ultra Technology, a 1,792 MW power station (Power Station 5) utilising the world’s first H-class General Electric (GE) 9HA gas turbine (GT) and other industrial services.

Alba Potline 6 was commissioned last year, ahead of schedule; and since then, there has been a gradual ramp-up with the successful start-up of 106 pots on March 26 this year and 212 pots thereafter on April 18.

Commenting on the occasion, Shaikh Daij said: “I would like to thank all Alba employees and contractors for the continued success on the safe start-up of Line 6. I am confident that the Line 6 start-up team will continue to take Extreme Ownership on Safety as we approach the final stages of the ramp-up,” he added.

 Bechtel is the EPCM contractor for the Line 6 expansion project smelter. For Power Station 5 (PS 5), GE and Gama Consortium was awarded the EPC contract, while Siemens is the power distribution system contractor.