Balancing the Modern Challenge of Operating Aluminium Smelters—Minimizing Energy Consumption, Minimizing Greenhouse Gas Emissions, and Maximizing the Productivity of Assets

By applying fundamental data and developing simplified correlations while assuming uniform conditions in the cells, the aluminium industry has been able to design better cells and steadily improve the environmental performance, energy, and faradaic efficiencies. However, with the high capital and operating costs of the technology’s retrofits aimed at increasing the productivity of installed capacity, the retrofitted cells have not always been able to sustain their previous environmental standards and production efficiencies. Hence challenges have emerged, with it becoming evident that the changed “physics” such as those contributing to magneto-hydrodynamic stability, alumina dissolution, electrolyte mixing, spatial heat generation and its transfer can all contribute to the deterioration in some of the key performance indicators and operating cost factors. Advancing the technology further is likely to be reliant on developing the design operating and control practices that solve these challenges.