Alcoa has been forced to reduce production at its Kwinana alumina refinery in Western Australia and Wesfarmers has resorted to emergency gas in storage as the impact of an ongoing outage at a major production plant owned by Chevron worsens across the state.

WA’s biggest gas retailer, Alinta Energy, has turned to gas stored in a plant north of Perth to double supply into the state’s domestic gas market, but that has not prevented Alcoa from having to take one alumina refining unit offline. South32 gas meanwhile minimised gas use across its alumina operations as manufacturers hold their breath for the hoped-for restart of the Wheatstone gas plant, due on Wednesday.