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(AMM) Century Aluminum holds off restart despite rising aluminum tags

February 24, 2010 - 22:04 GMT Location: NEW YORK

KEYWORDS: Century Aluminum , Ravenswood , aluminum , smelter

Aluminum prices are finally high enough to warrant a restart at Century Aluminum Co.'s shuttered smelter in Ravenswood, W.Va., but the company won't be firing up any potlines just yet.

Three-month aluminum on the London Metal Exchange closed second-ring trade Wednesday at $2,113.50 a tonne, well into the $2,000-plus range that Logan W. Kruger, president and chief executive officer, said in October could justify a restart. Prices also have been relatively stable, settling below the symbolic $2,000-a-tonne mark just once over the past three months.

But higher prices alone won't cut it, Kruger said this week, noting that both a long-term power arrangement and a new labor contract must be in place for the company to consider bringing back online the 170,000-tonne-per-year smelter. Century's highest-cost smelter was idled in February 2009 amid deteriorating market conditions.

"We are constantly looking at the capacity we have curtailed and analyzing under what circumstances it might make sense to consider reopening it," Kruger told investors during a conference call Tuesday evening.

For Ravenswood, those circumstances include a new long-term...

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