PRESCRIPTION FOR AN EFFICIENT, PROFITABLE U. S. ALUMINUM INDUSTRY.

In recent years it has become fashionable to write off U. S. primary aluminum production as a decliming industry, doomed to extinction mainly by high power costs. Not long ago the president of Industrial Venezolana de Aluminio (C. A. ) invited U. S. producers to abandon smelting and concentrate on downstream activities, leaving primary production to Australia, Brazil, Canada and Venezuela where power is cheap. According to the author, its problems, including high power rates, are man-made and are reversible.