Novelis casts first ingot at new German plant

Novelis has successfully cast the first production-sized ingot – almost 10 meters long – at its €200 million ($271 million) aluminum production facility in Nachterstedt, Germany.

The casting center is located next to Novelis’ existing aluminium rolling mill. It will be able to produce up to 400,000 metric tons of recycled-content aluminum sheet ingot per year and is projected by the company to be the world’s largest secondary aluminum production plant.

“We are very pleased with the steady progress on the construction and ramp-up of our recycling center in Nachterstedt,” says Erwin Mayr, vice president of Atlanta-based Novelis and president of Novelis Europe. “This major investment further highlights our long-term sustainability commitment to dramatically increase the recycled content of our products across all market segments and save valuable natural resources while enabling our customers to create products with a smaller environmental footprint.”

The facility will melt used beverage cans as well as several other forms of aluminum scrap from throughout Europe.