AMM Awards: 2012 Aluminum Excellence Finalists

Like the aluminum industry itself, American Metal Market will be rolling out something valuable this month when we announce our first-ever Awards for Aluminum Excellence to recognize the best in the industry.  Here, we profile the finalists: 15 companies and four individuals.  We will announce the winners at a June 12 ceremony during our second annual Aluminum Summit June 11-13 in New York.

Long Beach, Calif.-based Almex USA Inc. has developed the Minicast, a modular, scalable, environmentally friendly in-line scrap recycling facility. Aluminum extruders and forgers, as well as machine shops, generate up to 50 percent of their metal buy as turn-around scrap. While larger plants have in-house remelt facilities, smaller mills sell into the secondary market. The Minicast allows those mills to recycle the turn-around scrap quickly and on site, lowering conversion costs, saving transportation expenses, reducing carbon footprints and lowering inventory carrying costs. Almex estimates those savings at 25 to 35 percent, depending on volumes involved. The Minicast, which is scalable to match the growth trajectory of mills, can be applied to capacities as low as 200 tons per month or to more than 3,000 tons per month.

Aoki Science Institute

Aoki Science Institute Co. Ltd., Tokyo, sought to develop a highly efficient aluminum die-casting lubricant whose consumption would be far less than that of conventional emulsion lubricants. The result was oil-type lubricant WFR. After developing WFR, Aoki offered the innovative lubricant to aluminum die casters to improve production efficiency, saving production costs and reducing carbon dioxide generation. Aoki’s lubricant sales volume is increasing about 15 percent every year and has a 12-percent share of the Japanese market, and research and development costs have already been recovered. Aoki has been able to establish business relationships with large companies such as Honda Motor Co. Ltd., Nissan Motor Co. Ltd., Peugeot SA, Ryobi Ltd. and Toyota Motor Corp., reducing operational costs and improving the environmental impact at many of the companies.....