UAE's Eships wins EMAL contact to transport alumina

DUBAI, Oct 18 (Reuters) - The UAE's Emirates Ship Investment Company (Eships) has won a contract to transport around 1 million tonnes of alumina annually from Australia to Emirates Aluminium (EMAL), the company said on Sunday. Emal is expected to be the world's single largest aluminium smelter complex with this project. Production from the first phase of the $5.7 billion project is expected to start by the end of the year and will reach full capacity of 700,000 metric tonnes of aluminium per year (tpy) by December 2010. The three-year contract, awarded to Eships following a tender involving more than 15 shipping companies, will start next year, a company statement said. Eships will transport the alumina in lots of 60,000 tonnes in modern "Panamax" ships -- the largest ships able to pass through the Panama Canal, it said. The ships will initially unload at Jebel Ali port in Dubai, but will switch to Khalifa Port located at Al Taweelah in Abu Dhabi when ready. Eships is an Abu Dhabi-based ship owner and operator controlling 11 tankers and bulk carriers. The company is owned jointly by the Abu Dhabi Investment Company and Mubadala Development Company (Mubadala), Abu Dhabi's investment vehicle. Other Eships customers in the region include Aluminium Bahrain (Alba) and Emirates Steel Industries (ESI). EMAL is a 50-50 joint venture between Dubai Aluminium Company Limited (DUBAL) and Mubadala. 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 Amena Bakr; Editing by Alex Richardson)