London Metal Exchange aluminium prices surged Tuesday to levels last seen in late January, driven by escalating tensions in Guinea, with traders expecting further upside as political uncertainty there continues.

Three-month aluminium rose to a PM kerb of $2,820 a metric ton, up nearly 4% from Monday to prices last seen Jan. 25.

Martial law in Guinea and the bullish tone across the whole base metals complex helped boost aluminium prices, which are likely to rise further in the near term, said an LME trader.

Guinea is a leading producer of bauxite, which is an essential component used to produce aluminium.

Tuesday, Guinean President Lansana Conte instituted martial law until Feb. 23 after days of deadly protests. The protests were triggered over the weekend following Conte’s appointment of a close ally from his Cabinet as prime minister, a move the opposition said sidestepped a power-sharing agreement.

Many major companies have been affected by the violence, with Alcoa Inc. saying Tuesday that its production of bauxite at its CBG operations had been halted and Rusal saying production had been cut at its Friguia alumina refinery. Rio Tinto PLC said it has evacuated 16 of its staff from the country.

In addition, market speculation of a possible takeover of U.S. aluminium giant Alcoa by Rio Tinto or BHP Billiton was another supportive factor for prices, the LME trader said.

However, strength extended across the entire base metals complex. Copper prices climbed roughly 4% to a PM kerb of $5,749/ton triggered by a decrease in LME copper stocks by 2,800 tons to 213,250 tons.

Michael Widmer of Calyon also pointed to bullish macroeconomic data out of Germany as adding to base metal price support, particularly for copper.

The German Center for European Economic Research’s business expectations index rose for the third straight month to +2.9 points in February from -3.6 points in January, signaling a pickup in economic activity in around 6 months time.

Three-month nickel prices jumped roughly 3% to a PM kerb of $36,000/ton “buoyed by gains reflected across the rest of the complex,” Barclays Capital said.

There are more than 600 new sites of copper, iron, lead and zinc ore deposits in China’s Qinghai-Tibet plateau, which if exploited, could ease the country’s shortage of mineral resources, a government agency said Wednesday.

The plateau is estimated to have 30 million-40 million metric tons of copper resources, 40 million tons of lead and zinc resources and billions of tons of iron, according to the China Geological Survey, an agency responsible for mineral exploration under the Ministry of Land and Resources.

The agency has been surveying the area for the past seven years to look for mineral reserves.

“The figures are only conservative estimates and real reserves amounts can be much larger,” said Zhuang Yuxun, director of the CGS’s Department Of Geological Investigation.

New discoveries of copper deposits in the Qinghai-Tibet plateau should be able to raise the country’s copper concentrate output by 30%, or 250,000 tons, a year, the agency said.

Exploitation of three of the plateau’s copper mines in Qulong, Pulang and Yangla regions has already begun, Zhuang said.

“The locations of newly-discovered copper reserves are close to the Qinghai-Tibet railway so the new supply can come to the market in two to three years,” he added.

With transport infrastructure in place and private investors’ rising interest in developing mines, it won’t be too long before the reserves can help to alleviate the country’s need for copper, Zhuang said.

The CGS also discovered three large high-grade iron ore deposits in the area, including a rich one in the center of the plateau with reserves topping 500 million tons.

The iron content of the ore deposits is at 55%-70%, versus the country’s average level of 23%-24%, Zhuang said.

About 90% of China’s current iron ore supply is low grade.

However, Zhuang said it will take time to see actual supply coming in “as locations of iron reserves are in more remote areas.”

The Qinghai-Tibet plateau in China’s far west is at an average height of 4,300 meters above sea level, totaling an area of 2.6 million square kilometers.

It covers most of the Tibet Autonomous Region and Qinghai province, and part of Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu provinces and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The Chinese government discovered the rich resources on the plateau decades ago, but mineral exploration stopped, partly because supply was enough to meet the country’s demand then.

However, exploration for mineral resources is firmly back on the government’s agenda now as the country has been increasingly relying on mineral imports to feed its economic growth.

Zinc miner Zinifex does not expect any material cost after its ship MV Wunma became stuck and damaged in heavy seas as a result of Cyclone Nelson last week.

It also said that the incident would mean only moderate delays to its concentrate deliveries.

“Subject to receiving all the necessary approvals and certification, we are confident that the Wunma will return to service by early next week,” Zinifex said in a statement.

“On this basis, we do not expect any disruption to production at Century Mine and only a moderate delay to our concentrate deliveries.

“Accordingly we do not expect that there will be a material cost associated with this incident.”

The ship was carrying 5,000 tonnes of zinc concentrate worth $US15 million ($A19.32 million) when it got into distress in the Gulf of Carpentaria during Cyclone Nelson.

The miner said the electrical system of the vessel needs repairs, but that they are expected to be finished by the weekend and it sustained no significant damage.

The cargo is also in good condition, with little water damage, and Zinifex said it will be recovered and sold.

The miner confirmed previously that production at its Century open-pit zinc mine in north-west Queensland was continuing unaffected by the incident, which led to the crew of 10 being rescued and the ship anchored.

Zinifex’s shares rose 65 cents or four per cent to $16.35 on Wednesday.

Copper retraced yesterday’s strong gains as LME stocks edged higher, although prices continued to be underpinned by strong demand levels.

Copper stocks were up by 1,650 tonnes to 214,900 tonnes, said daily LME inventory data.

At 2.01 pm, LME copper for three-month delivery was down at 5,730 usd a tonne having risen 279 usd to settle at 5,749 yesterday.

“Fund buying is coming back in and copper is rising,” said Standard Bank analyst Mike Skinner, adding that today’s dip was “to be expected” because of profit taking.

While copper was moderately lower, all of the other base metals’ prices were higher.

“Given the strong tone in the rest of the group, we don’t think (copper)prices will stay down for long,” said Man Financial analyst Ed Meir.

Aluminium prices jumped again as market players mulled supply threats from Guinea, West Africa, where worker unions resumed strike action.

The renewed strike disrupted bauxite mining, and bauxite and alumina shipments by Guinea, the world’s leading exporter of the ore.

Aluminium was up at 2,845 usd a tonne against 2,820 usd at the close yesterday.

In other metals, tin extended gains from Monday after Indonesian tin producing company PT Koba Tin suspended shipments from Bangka, Indonesia, following an investigation into alleged illegal mining.

Tin was up at 12,770 usd a tonne against 12,595 usd at the close yesterday.

Lead was up at 1,700 usd a tonne against 1,675 usd at the close yesterday. Zinc was up at 3,225 usd against 3,220 usd while nickel rose to 37,350 usd against 36,000 usd.

London Metal Exchange nickel took center stage Wednesday rising nearly 5% driven by falling inventories, but analysts say they will keep a close watch on whether Asia succumbs to major bouts of profit-taking.

Three-month nickel reached a more than one-week-old high at $37,800 a metric ton Wednesday triggered by an increase in canceled warrants and falling stock levels, said Michael Skinner of Standard Bank in London.

Canceled warrants – or material accounted for and to be drawn down at a later date – soared to 54% Wednesday from Tuesday’s 15%, leaving just 1,806 tons available to the market. This is less than half a day’s worth of global nickel consumption.

An owner of metal in LME warehouses holds a warrant. Some traders suggest that nickel warrants are tightly held by one particular market participant. This player can move its metal on and off warrant in warehouses and have some control over nickel stocks – and prices – as a result.

Profit-taking at the top of the price ranges is to be expected, said Skinner, but “we haven’t seen as much selling overnight in Asia” and will have to see whether this continues.

Meanwhile, three-month aluminium prices rose roughly 1% to a PM kerb of $2,828/ton on technical buying as political uncertainty in Guinea continued.

Guinea is a leading producer of bauxite, an essential component in producing aluminium.

Guinean President Lansana Conte has imposed martial law until Feb. 23 after days of violent protests. The demonstrations were triggered over the weekend following Conte’s appointment of a close ally from his Cabinet as prime minister, a move the opposition said sidestepped a power-sharing agreement.

However, an increase in aluminium stocks by 2,925 tons to 759,050 tons Wednesday capped gains. Aluminium inventories have climbed roughly 9% since the start of 2007.

In other metals, three-month copper traded down 0.5% to a PM kerb of $5,720/ton driven by a large increase in copper stocks by 1,650 tons Wednesday to 214,900 tons. Copper inventories have increased roughly 11% since the start of 2007.

Oil price weakness as well as easing strength in the euro added to copper price pressure.

Three-month zinc suddenly jumped in afternoon trade due to an erroneous trade by one participant, triggering stops and pushing prices sharply higher, according to one LME broker. Zinc rose roughly 2% to a PM kerb of $3,310/ton from Tuesday.

Earlier Wednesday, three-month tin prices hit a new record high of $12,800/ton before retreating modestly to a PM kerb of $12,695/ton.

“The main driver for prices continues to be uncertainty on the supply side stemming from Indonesia’s Bangka island,” said Kevin Norrish of Barclays Capital.

Indonesia recently shutdown its private mining and smelting operations on Bangka island, where the country’s largest tin reserve is located. Earlier this week, PT Koba Tin declared force majeure to its tin customers on shipments and deliveries of the metal.

Meanwhile, Switzerland’s Glencore International AG Tuesday demanded compensation from Bolivia’s government for nationalizing a tin smelter as part of President Evo Morales declared ambition to gain greater control of the country’s mineral wealth and refineries.

Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Surface Engineering and Thin Films IST, Brunswick, Germany, have developed a process to produce transparent, electrically conductive oxide coatings, which could prove ideal for clearing frosted-over windscreens on cold winter mornings.

In a unique approach, the researchers combined mid-frequency magnetron sputtering with a chemical reaction. The glass substrate is heated in a reactor and coated and then, in the course of magnetron sputtering, accelerated ions of inert gas ‘shoot’ atoms out of a zinc-aluminium plate. The metal atoms are deposited on the substrate in a vacuum.

For this coating to become both electrically conductive and transparent, the zinc needs to be oxidised, so that the aluminium and zinc atoms bond together. ‘We are now working to produce contacts for thin-film solar cells’, comments Dr Bernd Szyszka of the IST. ‘Transparent and electrically conductive coatings are also needed for flat monitor screens and electrically switchable window panes for buildings’.

This brought about the idea for the windshields. ‘A prerequisite for use of these coatings systems’, Szyszka continues, ‘is to convert the operating voltage for cars from 12 to 24 or even 42 volts’ – a conversion that is expected over the next two to four years to improve the configuration of electronic systems in motor vehicles.

Technically, the coatings can also function at low power, but manufacturing costs are then extremely high. With a higher voltage, thinner coatings suffice – which can be produced at substantially lower cost.

The advantage of the IST process is that it is exceptionally stable in operation, and the coatings can be applied rapidly and inexpensively. The IST researchers are presently using an industrial scale plant to coat glass substrates of up to 0.6 to 1m in size.

Nanophase Technologies Corporation today announced the availability of a new line of high purity zinc oxide nanoparticles primarily targeted for electronic, personal care and other applications requiring UV protection combined with a very high degree of transparency. The new product line provides essentially spherical zinc oxide nanoparticles that are approximately 20nm narrow particle size distributions, while retaining their discrete non-aggregating properties. Nanophase produces three mean product sizes 60, 35 and 20nm. All product lines offer high particle and surface chemical purity and are manufactured to ISO-9001, USP, and cGMP standards.

“We believe that there are a variety of applications for these smaller nanocrystalline materials,” stated Dr. Don Freed, Nanophase’s vice-president of business development. “It has been demonstrated that different size nanoparticles of the same material may have distinctly different physical properties and behave differently in applications. We intend to expand our product offerings and plan to offer small versions of additional oxide products in the near future”.

The new zinc oxide products are available as dry powders or as stable dispersions in a variety of solvents, both aqueous and organic. Surface treatment using Nanophase’s patented Discrete Particle Encapsulation (DPE) process and engineered to meet specific customer applications such as transparent coatings designed to protect against ultraviolet and infrared radiation (similar in concept to the Company’s already successful sunscreen products, but designed for industrial uses) is also possible.

The zinc oxide products are also suited to electronics applications such as capacitors, varistors, photoprinting and electrophotography due to extremely low levels of heavy metal impurities. Other intermediate particle sizes can also be manufactured due to the inherent flexibility of the PVS process allows the company to manufacture various intermediate particle sizes to meet customer-specific applications.

An advanced friction stir welding tool has been developed by TWI that achieves an increase in travel speed of 150%. The new development was announced at the recent meeting on ‘Friction stir welding of transport structures’ held at the end of September.

Project sponsors welcomed the considerable increase in welding speed, which is achieved while maintaining or improving the existing high weld quality of the process.

Welding trials have been conducted on the normally difficult to weld aerospace Al-Zn alloy 7075-T7351. So far, a welding speed of more than 400mm per minute has been achieved when making butt joints in 6.35mm thick material. This represents an increase of at least 150% on the speed achievable with current commercially available friction stir welding tools. This tool also produces a higher weld nugget hardness, leading to higher tensile strength values. Even higher speeds are expected by changing the tool path about the axis of rotation. Trials are continuing

Introduction

The effects of corrosion are well known and range from the obvious, the rust we see on motor vehicles and its effect on steel constructions such as the Sydney Harbour Bridge, to the lesser known economic costs to the community such as the short lifespan of farm fencing experienced in some parts of Australia. In the battle against corrosion, which costs Australia about 2% of GDP annually, scientists from CSIRO in collaboration with the Industrial Galvanisers Corporation (IGC) have developed a new online tool that pinpoints corrosion hot spots and offers industry a more accurate prediction of the effects of corrosion on steel and galvanised products.
Corrosion Mapping System

The corrosion mapping system (CMS) is based on the corrosion map of Australia developed by CSIRO, which estimates the corrosion rate in every locality of the country, including all 14,700 towns and suburbs, together with case history data of performance information about coatings collated by IGC during the past 25 years. “CMS incorporates a large amount of this data with the corrosion maps to provide an exciting new tool for predicting the corrosion rates of steel, galvanised and zinc coated products used in Australia,” says John Robinson, Group Development Manager for IGC.
Geographic Information Systems

Using geographic information systems (GIS), a corrosion model based on both statistical and process simulation was developed at CSIRO Built Environment in collaboration with its Infrastructure Systems Engineering and Sustainable Materials Engineering teams. “The map incorporates a corrosion model based on climatic conditions such as moisture, prevailing winds, salinity and pollution developed during many years of research by CSIRO,” says Stephen Pahos, Business Development Manager for CSIRO Infrastructure Systems Engineering (CISE). The model makes the following simple assumptions:

· Corrosion is influenced by two basic factors, salinity and moisture (time of wetness or TOW)

· If industrial pollution is neglected, then distance from the coast, topography, prevailing winds and the type of coast (surf or bay) will influence salinity levels

· Moisture is basically influenced by climatic parameters such as relative humidity and temperature.

The TOW, or the time a metal surface is assumed to be wet, is calculated from relative humidity and temperature records in 136 Bureau of Meteorology sites using a method suggested by the International Standards Organisation. An Australian-wide surface model of TOW is constructed from the 136 values using a geo-statistical technique called ‘Kriging.’ Figure 1 illustrates the resulting surface model for TOW.
Estimating Corrosion Rate

The corrosion rate in each of more than 14,700 localities, including towns and suburbs in Australia, is then estimated by:

· Representing each locality as a point defined by a pair of co-ordinates (longitude and latitude)

· TOW at each locality is estimated from the surface model shown in figure 1

· The amount of salt transported to each locality from the coast is simulated, figure 2

· A surface model of corrosion rate is derived from the corrosion estimates in the 14,700+ localities, figure 3.

Using CSIRO’s existing Building Information Exchange (BIEX) internet portal, and the integrated corrosion information system, corrosion maps and models can be accessed online easily and in a cost effective manner. Using the internet, users can ‘click’ on to a region in Australia from a master map and have the degradation profile for various materials reported back in microns of material lost per year. It is also possible to add value to these models and maps by coupling them with service life estimation and material selection applications.
Materials Design for Location

This information is important to ensure that the correct materials are being used for each application. For example, it could be possible to order a steel section coated with ‘x microns’ of coating to get a given life expectancy in a particular region of the nation. This type of approach to material selection will see materials being designed for use, saving on raw materials consumption, pollution and costs associated with premature degradation of assets.
Other Uses for the Corrosion Mapping System

The CMS is currently being used by IGC to manage its coating guarantee programmes for its galvanised coatings and galvanised steel products. IGC offers comprehensive durability guarantees for specific projects in which its coating guarantees range from 15 to 50 years, depending on the project environment and client requirements.

“The expanding demand for performance guarantees on our products means CSIRO’s CMS is very attractive,” says Robinson. “It will help IGC manage its own coating guarantee projects and provide design professionals with real time corrosion data.”

Robinson also believes there are environmental and community benefits arising from this development. “It will give the specifying community access to environmental sustainability materials and construction information, including the greenhouse contribution of various construction materials,” he says.
Materials Specifications

In conjunction with the corrosion mapping programme, IGC is involved, though its industry association, the Galvanisers Association of Australia, in the development of a durability branding programme for steel products, particularly those used in construction.

Many steel construction products and builders hardware are not adequately protected from corrosion and do not give acceptable life in service. “This (the durability branding) will allow end users and specifiers to quickly identify the durability of a coated steel product through a certified ‘star rating’ system,” says Robinson.

As the demand for reliable, long term durability for steel construction products increases, and designers become more accountable for material durability performance, using the durability branding in conjunction with corrosion mapping will allow both consumers and designers to determine maintenance-free life in real time, in any environment with a high degree of confidence.
Application to Other Countries

The system can be applied to any country, assuming the data is available. CSIRO are currently working with IGC in South East Asia providing technical support for construction durability programmes in Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand. The corrosion mapping technology is expected to be expanded into these areas to assist in improving the durability of infrastructure and construction, where in the past, quality standards have led to short economic infrastructure life.
Availability of the CMS System

The CMS for IGC will be made available through its website, which is currently hosting a demonstration version of the CMS programme in the technical section of the site. In addition to the durability information, additional modules will provide information about inground corrosion of steel and environmental sustainability data for a range of construction materials.

The cost to industry will be relatively small. CSIRO is planning to create a web service to deliver the accumulated knowledge of its databases. During the next few years it will broaden its service with more and more data being delivered as people want it through the internet. CSIRO intends to offer its service on a subscription basis in which consumers can access the information after paying an annual fee.
Concluding Remarks

While there are internet based databases that will provide some corrosion data, CSIRO believes its CMS is the first online corrosion mapping system in the world. “The cost of the battle against corrosion in Australia is significant. It is a battle that is wearing away the infrastructure of our economy,” says Pahos. “Applying this type of technology to help reduce the effects of corrosion will significantly boost Australia’s competitiveness in the world.”

The benefits to the Australian economy have been focused on environmental and cost issues and CSIRO believes there is no reason to assume that the same benefits could not be realised in UK and European environments.

NKK and NKK Steel Sheet and Strip Corp have jointly developed a new type of 55% Al-Zn alloy steel sheet. Called ‘Super Genius’, it offers corrosion resistance twice that of the previous ‘Genius’ product. It is manufactured by applying an organic/inorganic composite coating that effects a remedial action on cracks created during manufacture.