Sanctions imposed by the UK government against Russia are growing and include Russian ships banned from UK ports, further sanctions on UK individuals and entities are restricted from undertaking financial transactions with the Russian Central Bank and Russia’s state-owned sovereign wealth fund and its chief executive have been sanctioned. These are new additions to this they have been applied over the last 4 days by the UK government that can be found https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/uk-sanctions-on-russia.
There are no current sanctions on Russian companies based in the UK, for example the Rusal Anghinshin Plant that produces Alumina for consumption in the UK and Europe is still trading freely at this time. This may change as the UK, USA and EU decide to widen the sanction regime on Russia.
In excess of a million tonnes of aluminium was imported in to the UK in 2021, less than 15K tonnes came from Russia and that material was in the form of primary cast ingot. This volume will have little direct impact on the UK aluminium industry because ingot can be quickly resourced unlike slab, billet or semi’s.
There maybe an indirect impact if UK companies are sourcing from the EU, 35% of Alumina consumed in the EU is purchased from Russian owned production facilities and almost 15% of primary material consumed in the EU comes from Russian owned assets.
The most noteworthy and severe impact for the UK aluminium sector and for manufacturing is the cost of energy and the effect that will have on the price of aluminium.
We are consulting with government on the impact of any additional related sanctions will have on the UK aluminum sector and will ensure any updates are posted on the ALFED website and include in all communications.
