Alcoa - History

History

In 1886, Charles Martin Hall, a graduate of Ohio's Oberlin College, discovered the process of smelting aluminum, almost simultaneously with Paul Héroult in France. He realized that by passing an electrical current through a bath of cryolite and aluminum oxide, then the semi-rare metal aluminum remained as a byproduct. This discovery, now called the Hall-Héroult process, is still the only process used to make aluminum.

Probably fewer than ten sites in the US and Europe produced any aluminum at the time. In 1887, Hall made an agreement to try his process at the Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company plant in Lockport, New York, but it was not used and Hall left after one year. On Thanksgiving Day 1888, with the help of Alfred E. Hunt, he started the Pittsburgh Reduction Company with an experimental smelting plant on Smallman Street in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1891, the company went into production in New Kensington, Pennsylvania. In 1895, a third site opened at Niagara Falls. By about 1903, after a settlement with Hall's former employer, and while its patents were in force, the company was the only legal supplier of aluminum in the US.

"The Aluminum Company of America"—became the firm's new name in 1907. The acronym "Alcoa" was coined in 1910, given as a name to two of the locales where major corporate facilities were located (although one of these has since been changed), and in 1999 was adopted as the official corporate name.

In 1938, the Justice Department charged Alcoa with illegal monopolization, and demanded that the company be dissolved. The case of United States v. Alcoa was settled six years later.

Alcoa purchased an 8% stake of Aluminium Corporation of China (Chalco) in 2001. It tried to formed a strategic alliance with China's largest aluminum producer, at its Pingguo facility; however, it was unsuccessful. Alcoa sold their stake in Chalco on September 12, 2007 for around $2 billion.

In 2004, Alcoa's specialty chemicals division was sold to Rhône Group, who then changed the name to Almatis, Inc..

In 2005 Alcoa acquired two major production facilities in Russia, at Samara and Belaya Kalitva.

In 2005, Alcoa began construction in Iceland on Alcoa Fjarðaál, a state-of-the-art aluminum smelter and the company's first greenfield smelter in more than 20 years, albeit under heavy criticism by local and international NGOs related to a controversial dam project exclusively dedicated to supplying electricity to this smelter. Also, Alcoa has completed or is undergoing primary aluminum expansion projects in Brazil, Jamaica, and Pinjarra, Western Australia.

In 2006, Alcoa relocated its top executives from Pittsburgh to New York City. Although the company's principal office is located in New York City, the company's operational headquarters are still located at its Corporate Center in Pittsburgh. Alcoa employs approximately 2,000 people at its Corporate Center in Pittsburgh and 60 at its principal office in New York.

Alcoa was named one of the top three most sustainable corporations in the world at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

On May 8, 2008, Klaus Kleinfeld was appointed new CEO of Alcoa, substituting Alain Belda. On April 23, 2010, Alcoa’s Board of Directors elected Kleinfeld to the office of Chairman, following Belda’s planned retirement.

On July 16, 2012, Alcoa announced that it will take over full ownership and operation of Evermore Recycling and make it part of Alcoa's Global Packaging group. Evermore Recycling is a leader in used beverage can recycling, purchasing more recycled cans than any other group worldwide.