Aluminium production starts with the mining of bauxite. Guinea (in West Africa), Australia and China account for over 70% of world production. In Australia, production takes place at:

• Gove in the Northern Territory
• near Weipa on the Cape York Peninsula in Queensland
• south of Perth in Western Australia

Bauxite is converted to alumina (aluminium oxide) in an extended industrial process. China accounts for nearly 60% of world alumina production. The main producers in Australia are:

• Rio Tinto at two plants at Gladstone in Queensland
• Alcoa at two plants south of Perth (Alcoa closed a third plant, at Kwinana in perth in 2024)
• South32 at one plant south of Perth

Alumina is then converted to aluminium metal using an electrolytic process. China accounts for 60% of world aluminium production, which is electricity intensive and typically located close to low-cost sources of electricity. Concerning these sources, production depends mainly on:

• coal in China, India and Russia
• hydro-energy in Canada, Brazil and Norway
• natural gas in the UAE and Bahrain

Strongly-increasing electricity prices in Australia threaten to remove the competitive advantage we once had in producing aluminium.