The major Chinese calcined bauxite producer will start operations at its newly constructed calcination plant in Guizhou in Q4. Although there is widespread environmental restriction on production, CMP has received all the governmental permits to continue production in both Guizhou and Tianjin.
Calcined bauxite producer China Mineral Processing (CMP) will be starting commercial production in its new plant in Guizhou, South West China in November.
The newly constructed 80,000tpa calcination facility with rotary kiln and pressurized shaft will start operation in end of October, producing rotary bauxite lump between 85-90% Al2O3.
The monthly output is expected at 8,000-10,000 tonnes/month in the longer-term, according to CMP.
«This is now certain and we have all the permits required plus we are unrestricted in production in the 4th quarter 2017 – for calcinations of our own mine produced bauxite,» James Devlin, managing director of CMP Europe sales, told IM.
CMP has a bauxite mine with estimated reserves of 3m tonnes in Xiuwen, north of Guiyang, and the mine will be supplying the calcination plant with raw material. The mine has been in production since June 2012.
In addition, the company also has a supply contract with Aluminium Corp of China Ltd (Chalco) Guizhou, which would provide them with additional bauxite raw material.
Due to the draconian anti-pollution measures enforced by the central Chinese government, mining and industrial activities in provinces around Beijing will be greatly restricted from 1 October onwards.
CMP expects production in Guizhou to be greatly reduced in October due to the ban on explosives use but operations should return to normal between November and March 2018. This is because unlike Shanxi, Guizhou is far away from any big city and is located more than 2,000km away from Beijing, hence the province is subjected to less scrutiny compared to Shanxi.
Bauxite lump produced in Guizhou will be exported from South China ports, or transported in bulk to CMP’s crushing plant in Tianjin in late December or January 2018 for processing into sized refractory material.
Although CMP’s crushing plant in Tianjin has received environmental permission to work continuously through November – March 2018, the facility could run out of raw material to crush after 15 November due to a shortage of bauxite.
«Work in CMP Tianjin could to be interrupted because of the shortage of bauxite (dynamite and mining restrictions) in October and because of environmental closures of the calcinations plants in Shanxi after 15 November,» Devlin said .
Due to the scarcity of bauxite in the market, demand for the refractory minerals remains very strong.
«We already got the first two containers in September 2017 for testing in Europe,» Devlin said.
To date 3,000 tonnes of bauxite lump and 6,000 tonnes of crushed material have also been sold to different clients for delivery in December-January 2018, according to delivery.
