Building & Construction
September 1, 2026
AMU Summit: Energy critical to reviving aluminum production
Written by Stephanie Ritenbaugh
Reviving primary aluminum production in the US will need to go hand in hand with revamping domestic energy policy, according to a panel of speakers at AMU Summit 2026.
“Until you address the energy side of this, primary production is going to be in hold,” Joe Quinn, executive director for the Center for Strategic Industrial Materials Securing America’s Future Energy (SAFE), told the conference in Atlanta. “We all know that the tariff will increase the price of the product. Our view is that we need to lower the cost of production, and to do that is through energy policy.”
Smelters are competing with data centers, which draw significant amounts of power. The International Energy Agency (IEA) projects global electricity consumption by data centers will double to reach about 945 TWh by 2030.
China and the United States are the largest sources of data center electricity consumption growth, accounting for nearly 80% through 2030, according to the IEA.
Meanwhile, finite electrical grids must also accommodate other consumers and wider electrification demand in the future.
“We have an entire new class of baseload energy consumer,” said Charles Johnson, president and CEO of the Arlington, Va.-based Aluminum Association.
Quinn said there is an opportunity for aluminum.
“There’s a lot of attention on AI and data centers, and there’s a lot of attention on critical minerals, and you have aluminum in the middle there that can support both growth,” Quinn said. “If you look at it from the end use of data centers, there’s competition on the energy side, but one could argue that’s an end market for the metal. On the critical mineral side, aluminum has been deemed the critical mineral, and you’re seeing the [Trump] administration move quickly to increase production.”
“I think aluminum can be helpfully swept up in that momentum, and to get more attention and more funding within the Pentagon,” he said.
Jean Simard, president and CEO of the Aluminium Association of Canada, said electricity represents about 40% of smelting inputs, making dependable, long-term power contracts essential to restarts and new projects. Canadian energy is a regional advantage, he said.
“We’re in a trading space called USMCA that brings three countries that are totally integrated into an industrial value chain,” Simard said. “And we have to fence out non-market-based economy metal to be able to thrive together on this trading space.”
Simard pointed to the recent deal for renewable energy investment, Churchill Falls generation station, and other electricity projects in Labrador.
“To me, it’s a North American story. It’s not a Canadian story. It’s not an American story. It’s working together to grow the pie.”
