Alcoa, the world's third largest producer of aluminum, is conducting a review of its smelting and refining operations. The company is analyzing its global smelting and refining capacity as it looks forward to divesting assets, cutting costs, reducing plant sizes or shutting them.

Alcoa’s Kwinana refinery, south of Perth, yields the least profit and is the oldest processing operation in WA and over 1,000 people are working there. The review is being conducted after the closure of Alcoa’s 50-year-old Point Henry aluminum smelter at Geelong in 2014. It was closed after the company took decision that there were no chances that the plant could work according to financial expectations.

As per Australian Workers’ Union Branch Secretary Stephen Price, Alcoa had limited manufacturing to reduce supply some time ago, but he expects that adequate restructuring and productivity improvements have already been done in WA.

According to Price, “Kwinana’s had a lot of focus on it over the last few years and as a result they’ve increased their productivity and lowered their costs. There’s probably some other high-cost operations that the company has around the globe that would be looked at before Kwinana”.

As per Construction, Forestry Mining and Energy Union mining secretary Gary Wood, the review would put a lot of stress on employees and their families. Around 4,000 people are working at Alcoa operations in WA, together with three alumina refineries at Pinjarra, Kwinana and Wagerup and the Huntly and Willowdale bauxite mines south of Perth.

According to Alcoa’s junior partner in Australia, Alumina, the review does not consider the Portland smelter in Victoria, where over 700 people are working. The Anglesea coal mine and power station in Victoria are also operated by Alcoa.