US primary aluminium production reached 167,000 tonnes in Q1 2026, slightly above a year earlier but 1.2 per cent below the previous quarter.
US primary aluminium production remained broadly stable at the start of 2026, with output edging higher from a year earlier even as it slipped slightly from the final quarter of 2025.
According to the aluminium supply data provided, US primary aluminium production reached 167,000 tonnes in Q1 2026, compared with 169,000 tonnes in Q4 2025 and 166,000 tonnes in Q1 2025.
That translates to a 1.2 per cent quarter-on-quarter decline from Q4 and a 0.6 per cent year-on-year increase from Q1 2025.
The quarter-on-quarter decline amounted to just 2,000 tonnes, suggesting that primary aluminium output was largely steady rather than undergoing a significant contraction.
The data does not provide a specific operational reason for the 2,000-tonne decline, and I could not find a sufficiently reliable public source attributing the change to a particular event such as maintenance, energy costs or a smelter disruption. It would therefore be speculative to assign a single cause.
US Federal Reserve data also shows primary aluminium production remained relatively stable around this period. Its quarterly industrial-production index for primary aluminium rose to 103.15 in Q1 2026, from 101.37 in Q4 2025 and 101.96 in Q1 2025 on a non-seasonally-adjusted basis.