Boyne Island aluminium smelter

Boyne Smelters Limited

Type	Limited company
Industry	Aluminium
Founded	1982
Headquarters	Boyne Island, Queensland, Australia
Key people	Joe Rea (General Manager)
Products	Aluminium
Production output	545,000 tonnes
Number of employees	1,247
Website	http://www.boynesmelters.com.au/

The Boyne Island Aluminium Smelter is located on Boyne Island, Queensland, Australia, approximately 12 km south of the port of Gladstone. The smelter has a production capacity of 545,000 tonnes of aluminium per year. The operating company Boyne Smelters Ltd is 59.4% owned by Rio Tinto Alcan with the balance held by a consortium of Japanese participants including Sumitomo, Marubeni, Mitsubishi and YKK Group. 2011 saw the construction of a new carbon bake furnace to replace the original bake furnace.

Construction of the smelter commenced in 1979 and the plant was officially opened in 1982. The concept of an aluminium industry in the state of Queensland, Australia began in 1957 when the Queensland Government and Comalco’s predecessor signed an agreement giving the company the right to develop a large bauxite deposit discovered two years earlier at Weipa on the remote far North West coast of Cape York Peninsula by the company.

The agreement required Comalco to accept a number of obligations, including establishing a plant in Queensland to refine bauxite to alumina and to investigate building an aluminium smelter to smelt alumina to aluminium. The first obligation was fulfilled in 1967 when a consortium by the company commenced operation of the Queensland Alumina Ltd. Gladstone refinery.

The economics of establishing a smelter improved dramatically after the discovery within Queensland of a number of new coal fields in the Bowen basin. In 1972 Comalco entered into further agreements with the State giving the company the right to opt for blocks of power from a new powerstation to be built at Gladstone. Partly funded by the Australian Government on the condition that a portion of the power would be used for export industry. In 1974 Comalco began detailed investigations into a site for an Aluminium smelter in the Gladstone area. The power agreement defined a radius from the powerstation for the establishment of the plant. A local office was established in Gladstone to conduct site selection, environmental studies and infrastructure requirements.