The Nexelia for Aluminium from Air Liquide S.A. - cutting emissions in smelters

Reviewed: ad hoc news B2B & Pro desk. Edited and checked on 2026-06-28, 01:03. Details in the imprint.

The Nexelia for Aluminium package from Air Liquide S.A. sits above a roaring melting furnace, its gas lances hissing softly as the flame turns a cleaner blue and operators watch dross levels drop on the control screen.

What Nexelia really is

Nexelia for Aluminium is not a single cylinder but a bundled offer: process analysis, tailored oxygen and gas mixtures, injection hardware and digital monitoring for melting and holding furnaces. It targets scrap-intensive casthouses where yield losses hit margins hard.

Air Liquide positions Nexelia solutions as turnkey performance packages, promising higher metal recovery, fewer emissions and faster cycle times compared with conventional air-fuel burners. In practice, engineers tune each installation according to furnace size, alloy family and scrap mix.

How it changes the melt

When process engineer Julien Benoît adjusts the oxygen-enrichment level on a Nexelia-equipped furnace, he sees the bath surface calm on the camera feed and hears less harsh popping as oily scrap burns off more evenly. Operators report a more stable flame pattern and a tidier furnace mouth.

By enriching combustion air with oxygen and using dedicated lances to inject gases into the bath, Nexelia can reduce the formation of aluminium oxide dross and improve metal yield versus classic air-fuel operation. Air Liquide cites typical yield gains of several percentage points in case studies with European casthouses.

Energy and emissions gains

According to Air Liquide, oxygen-enriched combustion and optimised burner settings in Nexelia for Aluminium can cut specific energy consumption in melting furnaces while maintaining throughput. In some customer examples, fuel savings of around 5-10 percent are reported.

Lower fuel use and more complete combustion translate into reduced CO? and NOx emissions compared with traditional air-fuel firing at the same production rate. For European smelters under tightening emissions rules, that combination of productivity and compliance is a practical selling point.

Digital control and service

Beyond hardware, Nexelia packages add digital monitoring of key furnace parameters, from bath temperature to off-gas composition. These data help maintenance teams spot drifts early and schedule interventions before yield losses become significant.

Product manager Jean-Marc Bourgeois describes Nexelia as a continuous-improvement loop: Air Liquide experts review production data regularly with customers, tweak gas flows and burner settings, then track the impact on yield and energy over several campaigns.

Where it fits in the market

Nexelia for Aluminium sits alongside similar packages for other metals and processes, such as Nexelia for Steel and Nexelia for Glass, forming a broader portfolio that ties gas supply contracts to performance commitments. This bundling is central to Air Liquide’s Advanced Technologies and Solutions strategy.

The approach reflects a quiet shift in the industrial gases business from commodity volumes toward service-rich, data-supported offers that help clients hit decarbonisation and efficiency targets. For aluminium producers, especially those melting high scrap ratios, the mix of yield improvements and emissions reductions is a convincing argument.

Context and Air Liquide shares

Air Liquide S.A. uses solutions like Nexelia for Aluminium to anchor long-term contracts in metals, energy and manufacturing, balancing cyclical demand with service revenue. Air Liquide S.A. shares (ISIN FR0000120073) trade on Euronext Paris, where they were quoted at 172.86 euros on 2026-06-26 at 16:35.

This article was AI-assisted and editorially reviewed. Product information without guarantee; prices and availability may change at short notice. No investment advice, no buy or sell recommendation. Stock-market transactions involve risks up to total loss.