The aluminium industry in Victoria

There are two aluminium smelters in Victoria, both owned by Alcoa. They are the Portland aluminium smelter, which produces approximately 358,000 tonnes of aluminium a year, and the Point Henry aluminium smelter, which has a a capacity of 190,000 tonnes of aluminium a year. Between them the two Victorian smelters account for approximately one third of Australian aluminium production.

Victorian aluminium smelters and coal-fired power stations
The Point Henry aluminium smelter was established in 1963. The 150 megawatt Anglesea Power Station, which is owned by Alcoa of Australia, supplies power to the smelter. The power station is located near Anglesea and, in 2009, was estimated to have emitted 1.317 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (Mt CO2e.) The Climate Group ranked the Anglesea power station as being, based on 2010 figures, the seventh most greenhouse gas emissions intensive power station in Australia. Alcoa estimates the power station as generating 1.2 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per tonne of aluminium production, a figure unchanged since 2006 and only marginally lower than in 1990.

The Anglesea Power Station is supplied with coal from the Anglesea mine, which produces approximately 1 million tonnes of coal a year. The mine is also owned by Alcoa. The company's Anglesea mine is located on what it referred to as the 'Anglesea Heath'. In 1961 the Victorian Parliament passed special legislation, the Mines (Aluminium Agreement) Act 1961 under which 7097 hectares of land has been leased to Alcoa for mining. The firm owns an additional 124 hectares of adjoining land.

Both the Point Henry smelter and the Portland smelter, which was commissioned in 1986, will be supplied with power by Loy Yang Power under contracts for 820 megawatts of power which run from until 2036. Loy Yang Power owns and operates the the 2210 megawatt brown-coal-fired Loy Yang A power station. Loy Yang Power is owned by AGL. The Loy Yang A power station was ranked, based on 2010 figures, as the the sixth most greenhouse gas emissions intensive power station in Australia.

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