Kazakhstani electrolysis plant - the owner of the special award of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan "Altyn sapa" - "Quality Leader" of JSC "Kazakhstan Electrolysis Plant", part of the Eurasian Group (ERG), last year won the competition for the prize of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan "Altyn Sapa ". The enterprise was awarded a special prize - "Quality Leader". KEP is one of the first large industrial projects implemented in the modern history of Kazakhstan. The plant is the first and only domestic producer of primary aluminum. Moreover, it introduced the best production technologies, aimed not only at producing high-quality aluminum, but also protecting the environment. It is worth noting that the KEP is a relatively young enterprise. Roman Romanov, President of JSC "Kazakhstan Electrolysis Plant" told how in a short period it was possible to achieve such impressive success and with what it all began. - For more than nine years, the Kazakhstan electrolysis plant has been producing domestic aluminum that meets all the requirements of international standards. Kazakhstani aluminum is registered on the London Metal Exchange, which confirms the high quality of the products - primary aluminum. The construction of the plant has started in 2005 and was finished in a record 27 months. In September 2007, KEP produced the first domestic aluminum. By the end of 2007, the Kazakh electrolysis plant produced 11,000 tons of primary aluminum. In June 2010, the Head of State Nursultan Nazarbayev launched the second stage of production and brought the enterprise to a design capacity of 250 thousand tons. In 2011 the enterprise completed with the volume of output of 251 thousand tons of Kazakhstani aluminum. Since its launch, the Kazakhstani electrolysis plant has produced about two million tons of primary aluminum. The quality of domestic aluminum largely depends on the raw materials and basic elements of the technological process. How does the enterprise work in this direction? In addition to the main product of production - 20-kilogram aluminum bars of grade A8 and A85, KEP fully satisfies its need in baked anodes, which are consumables in the process of aluminum electrolysis. In 2014, a new unit was launched at the Kazakh electrolysis plant - a shop for the production of electrodes, which allowed to abandon the purchase of burned anodes. In addition to the high quality of the products, the KEP is working to increase the share of local content and reduce the cost of manufactured products. KEP has almost completely abandoned imported raw materials and basic components in the production of aluminum. Work has been completed on replacement of foreign molds on foundry conveyors, which are now produced at the enterprise of the Eurasian Group - JSC Aluminum of Kazakhstan. As well as the current leads, which another enterprise ERG - JSC "SSGPO" supplies to KEP now. In addition, they began to use Pavlodar petroleum coke in the process of production of burned anodes,  which eventually will replace the raw materials of the Russian producer. In February of last year, the first batch of domestic calcined petroleum coke was delivered for the production of anodes at the KEP, and this raw material is successfully used in the process of anode production in proportion  to the Russian one - 50/50. This suggests that specialists managed to introduce Pavlodar coke, which has significant physical and chemical differences, while maintaining the quality of its products. At the same time, the economic effect of the use of local raw materials amounted to more than one billion tenge. Much attention is paid to the power consumption, spent at our enterprise. So in 2016, seven events were implemented, allowing to reduce this figure. The total savings amounted to more than million kWh. Such indicators were achieved due to the introduction of current-conducting lubricant in contact connections of electrolyzers, installation of energy-saving lamps in structural subdivisions of our plant, reduction of voltage on electrolysis cells after major repairs and a number of other measures. The Eurasian Group, which includes the Kazakhstan electrolysis plant, is one of the largest manufacturing companies. Its structure includes the industrial giants of the country. Great work is being done to further improve the indicators. What projects are being implemented now? - One of the most relevant is “10%” project, the main goal of which is to increase the efficiency of production processes, to reduce the cost of production, to increase profit and productivity of enterprises. The company intends to implement the project through the use of advanced approaches to planning and organization of work, activation of the internal rationalization potential of enterprises and introduction of proposals of employees in the production process.

To implement these tasks, the Laboratory of Operational Efficiency was established on the basis of the ERG Research and Development Center. One of the ways of implementing this project is rationalization, thanks to which our specialists manage to develop fairly effective projects, which in the future can be applied at other enterprises of the Eurasian Group. Priority projects were selected for 2016, program activities and implementation schedules were developed, as well as approaches to monitoring the implementation of projects in production and making adjustments. Last year the use of a new IT product - the "Accounting for rationalization proposals" program - was launched at the KEP, which allowed to completely translate work with rationalization proposals into an electronic format: from submitting an application for a rational proposal, further consideration and approval, to implementation and performance analysis. A new IT product is an opportunity to optimize work in this direction. In general, the management and employees of the Group's enterprises proposed to implement in 2016 more than 250 events, including both small rationalization initiatives and major projects to improve production efficiency. Total savings in the past year amounted to more than 41 million tenge. - It's not a secret for anyone that environmental issues are given paramount importance at your enterprise. Tell us about this in more detail - Kazakhstani electrolysis plant is a breakthrough project, one of 30 corporate leaders of our country, the plant is built on the latest technology and clean production. The most important factors determining the technical level, economics and ecology of electrolytic aluminum production are the power and the degree of perfection of the metallurgical units used in the industry - aluminum electrolyzers. Long-term studies of Russian and foreign scientists, as well as world practice, have shown that the highest technical, economic and environmental indicators in the production of aluminum are characterized by powerful electrolyzers with prebaked anodes. It is these high-current electrolyzers for 320kA and the dry gas purification system of industrial emissions that were introduced at the Kazakhstan electrolysis plant. All this allowed the KEP to become one of the most environmentally friendly enterprises in the global aluminum industry. A feature of the Kazakhstan electrolysis plant is that it uses dry gas scrubbing. Due to this, the gases formed in the process of aluminum electrolysis are filtered through a layer of alumina that adsorbs harmful impurities to itself, eliminating them into the environment, and also allows the return of expensive fluorosols back into production. To work at the level of the best foreign factories, the choice was stopped on the Norwegian firm Alstom. The advantage of the gas cleaning system of this company is waste-free. The technology is specially developed for aluminum production and is know-how. Specialists of the Sanitary and Epidemiological Service conduct systematic monitoring of the efficiency of the gas cleaning unit. The purification rate of the exhaust gases of the aluminum electrolysis shop is: for dust and fluorides - 99.9%, for fluoride hydrogen - 99.76%. Thus, a high degree of purification of the exhaust gases is guaranteed. In addition, almost simultaneously with the construction of the plant, the environmental project "Green Belt of the KEP" was implemented on its own. Within the framework of this event around 360,000 saplings of various trees and shrubs were planted around the Kazakhstan electrolysis plant. - What work is being done to support young specialists? - Of the total number of employees, which is more than 2,500 people, more than 48% are young specialists. JSC "Kazakhstan Electrolysis Plant" concluded agreements on the passage of industrial practice with educational institutions, such as the PSU named after A.Yu. S. Toraigyrov, Pavlodar College of Non-Ferrous Metallurgy, Pavlodar Polytechnic College. Now students can pass paid industrial practice, with the possibility of further employment at the enterprise. Since November 2015, JSC "Kazakhstan Electrolysis Plant" applies a provision "On allowances to young professionals", which determines the procedure and conditions for establishing additional payments to young specialists of the enterprise. In order to adapt the personnel in 2015, another regulation was developed and approved - "On Staff Adaptation", the purpose of which is to assign a mentor who is a highly qualified worker with a skill level no lower than 6 and a work experience of at least 3 years.

A lot of work is being done to involve workers in the social life of the plant. There are teams for such sports as football, basketball, volleyball, table tennis, etc at the KEP. The guys on a regular basis participate in various tournaments and sports days. - What do you think, what gives the businessmen participation in such a contest and what would you like to wish other participants? - Recognition of the level and quality of the produced product, but the main thing is the recognition of the contribution of each employee, whose work and skill allow to produce products of the highest quality. I would like to wish everyone success in achieving their goals and a single team, which is ready to implement all the plans!