EGA joins Australia’s HILT CRC to advance decarbonisation goals

UAE’s Emirates Global Aluminium (EGA) has taken a major step towards the decarbonisation of alumina refining by joining Australia’s Heavy Industry Low-carbon Transition Cooperative Research Centre (HILT CRC).

EGA, the Middle East’s biggest aluminium producer, is the first HILT CRC industry partner with operations entirely outside Australia. HILT CRC is focusing on decarbonising the production of steam for digestion and calcination in alumina refining.

The two processes account for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions from alumina refineries and are the most significant decarbonisation challenges at EGA’s Al Taweelah alumina refinery.

The company’s Al Taweelah alumina refinery began production in 2019 and is the only alumina refinery in the UAE. It also operates aluminium smelters in Abu Dhabi and Dubai and a bauxite mine and associated export facilities in Guinea. Its Al Taweelah alumina refinery produced 2.43 million tonnes of alumina in 2022, up 5 per cent.

“Joining HILT CRC enables EGA to participate with the Australian alumina refining industry in finding technological solutions to the toughest decarbonisation challenges in alumina refining,” said Abdulnasser Bin Kalban, CEO of EGA.

EGA is committed to reaching net zero by 2050 in line with the UAE’s Net Zero by 2050 Strategic Initiative and has a roadmap to decarbonise all its operations.

Founded in 2021, HILT CRC is a cooperative research centre bringing together industry, researchers and government to achieve technological breakthroughs in the decarbonisation of the steel, iron, alumina and cement industries.

EGA is joining 50 other partners across industry, research and government organisations who through HILT CRC will perform collaborative research dedicated to developing and demonstrating low-carbon technologies.

EGA’s 2022 performance

Meanwhile, EGA’s annual net profit rose by 34 per cent to $2.8bn (Dhs7.4bn) in 2022, from $1.5bn in the previous year.

Read: UAE’s EGA posts $2bn in full-year net profit on higher prices

The company said the average realised London Metal Exchange price for its metal was $2,715 per tonne. The benchmark LME daily price reached a decade-high in March of $3,985 per tonne, before retreating to a low of $2,080 last September.

The company’s revenue jumped by 36 per cent to Dhs34.6bn while cash generated from operating activities increased by 70 per cent to Dhs12.7bn.

EGA, which is owned equally by Mubadala Investment Company and Investment Corporation of Dubai, paid its shareholders a total of Dhs3.7bn consisting of an interim dividend of Dhs2.2bn in July and a further Dhs1.5bn at the end of 2022.

The company’s adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation EBITDA surged by 37 per cent in 2022 to a record Dhs12.4bn compared to Dhs9bn a year earlier.

It also registered an increase in production at every step of the aluminium value chain from mining to cast metal.

The UAE firm, which is owned equally by Mubadala Investment Company and Investment Corporation of Dubai, may sell shares to the public as soon as the third quarter of 2023.

“It will happen maybe this year. We’ll see how markets react. If it’s appropriate and makes sense for us and the shareholders, we might go in the third quarter or fourth quarter,” Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak, the CEO of Mubadala Investment Company said in an interview with Bloomberg on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos.

Read: Abu Dhabi says there’s more to come after year’s biggest IPO

The company has been examining the possibility of an initial public offering (IPO) for many years and its listing would follow a boom for IPOs in the UAE that started in 2022 – with at least eight companies expected to list on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange this year.