CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) -- Century Aluminum has notified the 600 workers at its Mount Holly aluminum smelter that it will close the plant by year's end unless it can reach a power transmission agreement with Santee Cooper, South Carolina's state-owned electric utility.
Century, based in Chicago, said in a news release Thursday it has secured a contract with a third-party provider to supply the power if it can reach an agreement to transmit that power over Santee Cooper lines.
"Century has been unable to reach an agreement with Santee Cooper to do so, despite Mt. Holly's offer to pay Santee Cooper the full transmission tariff rate — the same rate Santee Cooper charges other customers seeking similar service," the company said.
Santee Cooper spokeswoman Mollie Gore said she could not comment on contract talks but said, "the announcement is certainly sad news. Mount Holly has been a good customer for Santee Cooper."
Asked whether an agreement might be reached by Dec. 31, Gore said "there is certainly always a chance." But she added "the thing we can't do is agree to terms that would require us to increase costs for our other customers."
She said the utility serves other industrial customers in the state that employ 7,000 workers.
"Santee Cooper has offered Century everything that we could fairly offer to help them keep the plant operating, but in the end Century's leadership consistently required a deal that would unfairly increase costs to our other customers," the utility said in a later statement.
The Mount Holly aluminum plant began operation in 1980 and makes almost 250,000 tons of aluminum a year. Century operates four domestic aluminum plants as well as one in Iceland.
Century says it's also struggling against the low price of imported Chinese aluminum.
The company says, beginning Saturday, its plant in Hawesville, Kentucky, which employs 565 workers, will begin operating at 40 percent of capacity. Earlier, Century had said it planned to shut the plant entirely.
Michael Bless, the company's president and CEO said in a statement that the plant was competing against "the improper export of unfairly-subsidized Chinese aluminum products."
There was concern the Mount Holly plant would close three years ago but the company and Santee Cooper reached a contract amendment that expires Dec. 31, Gore said. She said that agreement saved the company $130 million over the contract term.
Century sent a letter to its Mount Holly plant warning them of the possible closure under a federal law requiring workers to be notified in the event of a mass layoff.