EMAL's aluminium smelter to start output next month

ABU DHABI, Nov 9 (Reuters) - Emirates Aluminium (EMAL), the world's biggest single aluminium smelter, will begin production next month, a top official at one of the joint venture's partners said on Monday. EMAL is a 50-50 joint venture between Dubai Aluminium Company Limited (DUBAL) and Mubadala Development Company (Mubadala), Abu Dhabi's investment vehicle. "It is virtually finished, in the next month, first hot metal will be produced," Waleed al Muhairi, Mubadala's chief operating officer, told reporters on the sidelines of an energy conference. "We will sell to two markets, which is China and Europe," he said, adding the project would entail building an aluminum-based cluster around this facility. The $5.7 billion project, located at Al Taweelah in Abu Dhabi, will have a full production capacity of 700,000 metric tonnes of aluminum per year from the first phase, expected to be reached by December 2010. The second phase will increase capacity to 1.4 million tonnes of aluminium per year and is expected to be completed in 2013-2014. (Reporting by Stanley Carvalho; Editing by Michael Urquhart)