Industry committee  I think there are two different ways to interpret their announcement. First, it shows that governments are supporting their aluminum industry. The Canadian government has been doing so for a long time, as has the Quebec government. The U.S. government has also begun to do so through its very powerful Inflation Reduction Act.

Industry committee  Well, we're doing everything we can to make it so. There are no plans for ELYSIS development projects anywhere other than Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean. Nor are we planning any elsewhere. That's our goal. I can't tell you much more than that. I should perhaps have pointed out at the beginning that for certain questions I might be asked about ELYSIS, I'm somewhat constrained by two things.

Industry committee  If you look at the industry globally, the average emissions of a smelter would be 12 tonnes of CO2 per tonne of aluminum produced. If you look at what we do today in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, we are probably at 2.3 tonnes—much lower. The reason is that most of the smelters in the world use, as a source of electricity, electricity taken from the grid, which has fossil fuel origins, whereas in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean we use hydroelectricity from our own hydro power plant.

Industry committee  Our plan—and, if I take a step back, Rio Tinto's plan as a group—is to lower its CO2 emissions by 50% by 2030 and to get close to zero by 2050, which is much more ambitious than the average in the mining industry. The emissions of Rio Tinto aluminum are 70% of the total of the emissions of Rio Tinto.

Industry committee  Thank you, Mr. Martel. I'm glad you asked that. It's important to know that 60% of our global aluminum production is in Canada. It's partly in Kitimat, British Columbia, but most of our Canadian production is in Saguenay. Saguenay is, and will continue to be, the focal point of Rio Tinto's worldwide aluminum production.

Industry committee  There will be short-term and long-term benefits. In the short term, by which I mean the next few years, we will continue to create jobs. In fact, we hire researchers in Canada and Quebec on a quarterly basis to work at our research centres in both Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean and Montreal.

Industry committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for this opportunity to be here today to discuss Rio Tinto's commitment to Canada, and more specifically the development of ELYSIS, a revolutionary technology being proudly developed in Quebec's Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean region.