Background

CRU Strategies is a specialist management consultancy providing advice to the world’s leading metals and mining companies, financial institutions and governments.

Recently CRU Strategies were asked to undertake a prefeasibility study to establish the market for, and the technical and commercial viability of, a continuous casting and cold rolling operation in the Middle East. Part of the project included a technical study and they approached us to help them with it.

How we were involved

We provided information on the optimal scale of the plant and the choice of technology. This was followed by an overview of the plant layout with construction and capital costs. We also advised on the raw material requirements, labour requirements and operating costs and we gave an overview of the environmental issues.

If a client, such as CRU Strategies, is looking for independent, honest and technically accurate advice for a prefeasibility study, we can help.

Following a market study, we can help the client define the best products to manufacture. With our detailed knowledge of process routes, we can then specify the equipment they will need to produce their products to world-class standards. And from our experience of working in plants all over the world, we can design a plant layout which maximises efficiency.

We also feed all financial information (including an estimation of the civil engineering costs) into our cost model to determine the project’s NPV (Net Present Value) and IRR (Internal rate of Return), and so assess its economic viability.

Services Involved

  • Strategic Support Summary
  • Strategic Support & Best Practice

This case study appears as an article in the 2009 edition of ‘innform’; the newsletter of Innoval Technology.

Because of their independence and well-known technical expertise in the field of aluminium rolling, it was the logical choice to bring Innoval on-board when we compiled this study. We hope to collaborate again on future aluminium projects.

Colin Pratt, Managing Consultant, CRU Strategies