Grant: Collaborative Research and Development Grants

This research program aims at generating scientific insights and providing advanced technical solutions for environmental and energy issues, encountered with one of the most important Canadian industries; Aluminum production. The proposed research programme is the continuity of a 5-year CRD programme, jointly supported by NSERC and Alcoa Canada Inc. The objectives of the present program are to identify the sources of energy loss and the parameters affecting thereof, to reveal their mechanisms, and to provide the solutions to increase the anode quality and consistency; all aiming at improving energy efficiency and reducing the environmental impact of the smelting process. To achieve this goal, advanced characterization techniques together with processing the plant data will be used to reveal the constitutive laws governing the material behaviours, either during manufacturing or in the electrolysis cell. Advanced modeling approaches will then be used to simulate the processes, allowing the optimization of material/process/design combinations, resulting in the best process performance. Upon the completion of the program, we expect to have a deep insight on materials properties and their behaviour during manufacturing as well as on process parameters and their influence on the final properties of anode; all allowing a better process control. The numerical models may allow assessing the sensitivity of the process with respect to different material/process parameters, exploring new designs, or performing virtual experiments, otherwise being extremely expensive or technically impossible.