Alcoa, headquartered in New York, has announced a long-term contract with Embraer, a leading manufacturer of commercial jets with up to 130 seats, valued at approximately $470 million. Under the multiyear agreement, Alcoa will supply aluminum sheet and plate for Embraer’s new E2s, the second generation of its E-Jets family of commercial aircraft, a narrow-body medium-range jet airliner. The Embraer E-Jets E2 were launched at the Paris Airshow in 2013 and are scheduled to enter into service in 2018.

“Our partnership with Embraer is rooted in constant innovation, and this contract is further proof of that strength,” says Mark Vrablec, president of Alcoa’s Aerospace & Automotive Products business. “Our patented alloys enable us to support our customer’s game-changing E2 program, and we’re proud that Alcoa will fly with Embraer.”

Embraer chose Alcoa’s proprietary alloys for the E2 because of their combination of strength, corrosion resistance and fatigue resistance, Alcoa says in a news release announcing the contract.

“Alcoa offers a good combination of technical expertise and industry leading material and capabilities,” says Fernando Queiroz, Embraer vice president, supply chain. “Embraer designed the E-Jets E2 commercial aircraft to be the best in its segment, and to do that we needed the best material in the business, and Alcoa offers the best solution.”

According to Embraer, the market segment that the new E2 program was designed to serve is projected to require 6,350 new aircraft during the next 20 years. In addition, Embraer says it has more than 50 percent market share by orders with the current E-Jet and expects to maintain similar levels with the new E-Jets E2 aircraft.

The long-term agreement makes Alcoa sole supplier to Embraer for proprietary wing skins and fuselage sheet on the E2 line of jets. Other Alcoa plate products, used in key applications such as wing ribs, fuselage frames and other structural parts of the aircraft, also are part of the contract and will be featured on the E2 as well as Embraer’s KC-390 military transport aircraft and executive jets.

Alcoa says it has developed most of the aluminum aerospace alloys to ever take flight and every major new aircraft program incorporates Alcoa’s product innovations. The Alcoa/Embraer partnership draws on the aerospace manufacturing capabilities of Alcoa’s Global Rolled Products business, supplying Embraer from its plants in Davenport, Iowa, and Kitts Green, United Kingdom.

Alcoa products can also be found on the Pratt & Whitney PurePower engines, including the forging for the first ever aluminum fan blade, featured in the E2 aircraft. 

The city of Houston has announced a partnership with the glass recycling company Strategic Materials Inc. (SMI), headquartered in the city, to handle glass generated by city residents. The agreement follows Waste Management’s decision earlier this year to remove glass from its citywide recyclables collection program.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner says, “Since the removal of glass from the City’s single stream recycling program earlier this year, we have been working to find ways for residents to conveniently continue to recycle glass. I want to thank Strategic Materials for stepping up to plate to provide a workable solution.”

The move to partner up with Strategic Materials comes after Waste Management renegotiated its contract with the city in light of low prices for the recyclables. The renegotiations included removing glass from the recyclables collected by the company.

Initially, Strategic Materials will work with industry partners and local communities to cover the cost of glass recycling boxes at 10 locations throughout the city with the longer-term goal of expanding the program. At present Houston has nine drop-off locations for glass.

“We are fortunate to be supported by the mayor and the city in the pursuit to further support glass recycling,” says Strategic Materials CEO Denis Suggs. “We hope to identify additional partners within the community and our customer base to grow the recycling locations in the upcoming weeks and months. Our innate desire to preserve our environment and keep our city clean brings us together in a meaningful way to support glass recycling in Houston.”

The new drop-off locations sponsored by SMI and partners are in addition to the nine existing neighborhood depositories where residents are able to recycle glass and other items.

International Paper (IP) a Memphis, Tennessee-based forest products company, has announced that it has completed the acquisition of Holmen Paper’s newsprint mill in Spain and the sale of its corrugated packaging business in China and Southeast Asia to Xiamen Bridge Hexing Equity Investment Partnership Enterprise.

When IP first announced plans to acquire the newsprint mill in Spain in March the company said it planned to invest about €150 million to convert the newsprint machine to produce recycled containerboard. The conversion is expected to be completed by the second half of 2017. The company says it expects the recycled board mill to produce 380,000 metric tons of finished product per year.

Along with the purchase of the mill in Spain, the acquisition included taking a 50% ownership interest in Holmen’s Peninsular Cogeneracion S.A. plant, a cogeneration facility, and Cartón y Papel Reciclado S.A. (Carpa), a recycling company with three locations in Spain.

When IP first announced the deal, Jean-Michel Ribieras, president of International Paper Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA), said, “We are constantly looking at ways to provide superior value for our customers. The Madrid facility represents a strategic opportunity to grow our corrugated packaging business in EMEA by further enhancing our value proposition and offering our customers even more choices in terms of innovative, tailored and high performing packaging solutions.

“This acquisition is a significant investment into the future of our corrugated packaging business in EMEA, our customers, our employees and our communities, and we are excited to be making this strategic step,” Ribieras continued.

In addition to announcing the completion of the mill in Spain, IP has completed the sale of its corrugated packaging business in China and Southeast Asia, which includes 18 plants and about 3,000 employees.

Under terms of the transaction, IP received about $150 million subject to postclosing adjustments and other payments, including the buyer's assumption of the liability for loans of about $50 million to be paid to International Paper within six months of closing of the sale.

Two of China’s largest steel producers are holding talks that could lead to a merger in a move likely prompted by direction from China’s government.

Both Baosteel Group and Wuhan Iron and Steel Co. (Wisco), who disclosed their intention to merge in late June 2016, are state-owned enterprises. China’s central government has been stating for several months that it sees mergers within its steel industry as a way to address the twin problems of excess capacity and red ink within the steel sector.

An online article from the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post (SCMP) says the two steel producers are making “strategic restructuring plans together” that could result in a merger.

The SCMP refers to Baosteel Group as China’s second largest steelmaker. While Wisco is smaller, adding its assets to Baosteel’s “would unseat domestic market leader Hebei Iron and Steel Group” to cause the merged entity to become China’s largest steel producer, pending any capacity cuts.

A merger of the two steelmakers would result in combined annual output of 60.7 million tonnes, according to the SCMP, putting it ahead of Hebei Iron and Steel Group’s 47.7 million tonnes of annual output.

The newly combined company would remain smaller than Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal, which produced more than 97.1 million tonnes of steel in 2015.

An analysis posted by Bloomberg News 29 June 2016 implies that without government prompting, it is uncertain whether Baosteel, which is profitable and considered to be well managed, would have an interest in Wisco, which lost $1.1 billion in 2015 and which has made a series of unprofitable investments in iron ore mining and production.