Alcoa closing Washington smelter

Alcoa Corp. recently closed its Wenatchee Works aluminum smelter in Washington state.

The facility, with a aluminum smelting capacity of 146,000 metric tons, had been idle since 2015. The decommission process has already begun with some of the facility’s 18 employees assisting with demolition and redevelopment work.

The approximately 2,800-acre site will be prepared for potential redevelopment and includes intermodal transportation and utility infrastructure.

“Our analysis does not support the long-term operation of the Wenatchee smelter, so we are now focused on preparing this site for a new future,” said Roy Harvey, president and CEO of Pittsburgh-based Alcoa. “We appreciate the support that Alcoa has received from our community stakeholders over these many years, and we look forward to continued work with them to develop a robust redevelopment and reuse plan for the site.”

In 2019, the company completed a five-year review of its smelting capacity. The closure aligns with the review and brings Alcoa’s smelting capacity to 2.8 million metric tons globally. The closure also brings the company to approximately 60 percent of its 1.5 million metric ton goal established in the review.

Cash outlays related to the site’s closure are forecasted to be approximately $60 million over the next seven years.