Residents of Portland in south-west Victoria, a city which relies heavily on its biggest employer, Alcoa’s Portland Aluminium, appear to have nothing to fear from US President Donald Trump’s plan to place tariffs on aluminium.
Every ingot of aluminium produced at Portland’s smelter – Victoria’s biggest – is shipped to Asia, which means potential US tariffs do not apply. The Portland plant is capable of producing up to 358,000 tonnes of aluminium a year.
But its entire output is in rectangular moulded ingots, each of which weighs 22.5kg. They are designed specifically for the Asian market, where large and small companies melt the ingots for a multitude of uses, from wire to computer frames to engine blocks and bicycles. The US market tends to import large aluminium slabs or cylindrical billets, neither of which are produced at the Portland plant.
Around 2019, when aluminium producers were suffering from low prices, Alcoa’s Portland Aluminium tried to sell a shipment of its product to the US. The price offered was so low the attempt was abandoned, and has never been revisited.
Industry Minister, Ed Husic (left) and head of Alcia Australia, Alsabe Muller (right) at Alcoa’s Portland Aluminium Smelter.Credit:
Portland has a population of about 10,000. The aluminium plant is estimated to support about 1600 workers, including those employed directly at the smelter, plus maintenance contractors, employees of engineering, trucking and other companies that serve the business, and those in hospitality and service industries.
The Mayor of the Glenelg Shire, Karen Stephens, said the shire had advocated for many years to ensure the aluminium company received crucial state and federal support because the community relied so heavily on its continued operations.
Ships sail from Portland loaded with ingots to markets in China, Japan, South Korea and the Philippines.
The Port of Portland’s chief financial officer, Mark Riley – who was previously employed as financial controller at Portland Aluminium – said that any Portland residents concerned about Trump’s tariff decisions could breathe easily. “From our perspective, US tariffs on aluminium would have zero effect on Portland,” he said.
