Rio Tinto (NYSE: RIO, ASX: RIO) announced Friday it is investing $35 million to build a new aluminum recycling facility at its Arvida Plant in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, Que.
The investment will expand its offering of low-carbon aluminum solutions for customers in the automotive, packaging and construction markets and the facility will make Rio Tinto the first primary aluminum producer in North America to incorporate recycled post-consumer aluminum into aluminum alloys, the company said.
Clean aluminum scrap sourced locally from used vehicles and construction materials will be re-melted to produce recycled content for use in aluminum billets at the Arvida smelter as well as other products from Rio Tinto’s Quebec facilities.
“Investing in new recycling facilities in Arvida is another step in our strategy to expand our offering of low carbon aluminum products and integrate the circular economy into our value chain,” Rio Tinto Aluminum managing director of Atlantic Operations Sebastien Ross said in a media statement.
“This will allow us to continue to meet our customers’ growing demand for responsible, traceable and responsible products.”
The recycling centre is expected to be operational in the second quarter of 2024 and will have an initial capacity of 30,000 tonnes per year.
Construction will begin in the coming months, Rio said, with a re-melting furnace equipped with regenerative burners and an automated scrap loading system to be installed in an existing building at the Arvida plant.
The project is expected to generate $30 million in economic benefits in Quebec and will create around 10 new permanent jobs at the Arvida Plant.
Rio Tinto shares were trading at $59.71 as of press time in Toronto on Friday, within a 52-week window of $53.83 and $84.69. It has a market cap of $96.7 billion.
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