Emirates Global Aluminium (EGA), the world’s biggest “premium aluminum” producer and the largest industrial company in the UAE outside oil and gas, has announced that BMW Group is the first customer for EGA’s CelestiAL aluminum, made with the power of the desert sun.
EGA has supplied metal to BMW Group since 2013 for use in the German carmaker’s engines and other parts. EGA will supply 43,000 tons of CelestiAL aluminum to BMW Group per year.
Using solar aluminum from EGA will reduce BMW Group’s CO2 emissions by 222,000 tons per year.
BMW Group’s annual supply contract with EGA is worth a three-digit million-dollar sum. EGA’s CelestiAL metal will cover almost half the annual requirements of Plant Landshut, the BMW Group’s only production facility for light metal casting in Europe. Last year, Plant Landshut produced 2.9 million cast metal components including engine parts such as cylinder heads and crankcases, parts for electric drive trains, and vehicle body parts.
EGA’s CelestiAL aluminum is made using electricity generated at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum Solar Park, located in the desert outside Dubai and operated by Dubai Electricity and Water Authority. EGA began production of CelestiAL earlier this month, the first time solar power has been used to produce aluminum commercially worldwide.
Producing aluminum is energy intensive, and generating electricity accounts for some 60 percent of the global aluminum industry’s greenhouse gas emissions. The use of solar power significantly reduces the emissions associated with aluminum smelting.
Abdulnasser bin Kalban, chief executive of EGA, said: “We are delighted that the BMW Group is the first customer for EGA’s low carbon CelestiAL. Aluminum is lightweight, strong and infinitely recyclable, and that is why it has an important role to play in developing a more sustainable society and making modern life possible. One key example of this is by improving the efficiency of vehicles through reducing their weight. But it also matters how sustainably aluminum is made. Solar aluminum is a step forward — it uses a natural and abundant source of energy in our desert environment to make a metal that is vital to our planet’s future.”
Dr. Andreas Wendt, BMW AG board member for purchasing and supplier network, said: “In EGA, we have found a strong partner who values sustainable development just as much as we do. It is a special honor for us to be the first customer to receive aluminum produced using solar electricity. Aluminum plays an important role in e-mobility and using sustainably produced
aluminum is tremendously important to our company.”
EGA’s sourcing of solar power from the Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park through Dubai’s electricity grid is tracked and traced through the use of the International Renewable Energy Certification System.
The Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park has a current installed capacity of some 1,013 MW with capacity to eventually reach 5,000 MW by 2030.
