Alcoa Corporation, the world’s third largest aluminum producer, announced last week that it has entered into a power purchase agreement (PPA) with Spanish renewable energy group Greenalia for 183 MW of baseload wind energy to power its smelter in Spain.
Due to skyrocketing electricity prices, Alcoa announced in December a two-year curtailment of aluminum smelting at the San Ciprian smelter. During the curtailment period, the company has been working to secure power purchase agreements to prepare the smelter for the planned restart in January 2024.
Before the deal was signed, Alcoa had negotiated a preliminary agreement with Greenalia five months ago for the supply of renewable energy to the site.
Greenalia agreed to supply the electricity from a collection of wind farms it plans to establish in Galicia, with a concentration on those created in Lugo province, where the San Ciprian smelter is located.
The energy company announced last week that it had chosen 29 wind projects with a total capacity of 924 MW to meet the new Alcoa requirement. It estimates that these projects will necessitate an investment of more than 1 billion euros (US 1.06 billion).
Since the wind farms are subject to permission process, the power supply will begin in 2024 and will last until the end of 2033, according to the agreement. Greenalia stated that Alcoa will then be able to meet 45% of the smelter’s electricity requirements for it to operate at full capacity.
Following Greenalia’s supply commitment in December, Alcoa signed similar pre-PPA agreements with Capital Energy and Endesa to secure wind electricity for its smelter.
The company announced in October its ambition to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emission across its global operations by 2050, aligning with its previous targets, which include reducing direct and indirect emissions from aluminum smelting and alumina refining operations by 30% by 2025 and 50% by 2030 from 2015 baselines.
