Firstenergy Corp. (FE)

[echarter]

Iron Ore Mining companies have planned pipelines for 50 years as a good way to ship concentrates, but hey!, an MLA from Newfoundland was never consulted so they must have missed something. Damn Iron companies, they should know better than to plan something like that without asking MP's about the obvious engineering problems!

640 KM is a long way to build a pipeline. One used to see Hanna Mining's and others pipeline right-of-ways on claim maps in Ontario for years. They never built one, which said more about the demand for steel and CDN iron ore vs Brazilian/Argentinian than it did about the pure economics of pumping Iron slurry in Northern Ontario.

I forget which Peruvian/Chilean Copper mine pumps slurry to the sea from the Andes. Is it Chucaquamita or Antamina?

It appears Antamina has one.
http://www.antamina.com/02_operacion/En_operacion.html

http://www.antamina.com/02_operacion/En_concen_03.html


I often wondered why not ship the stuff to a Fjord on the east coast rather than the longer distance to the St. Lawrence. I guess they were thinking about US markets via the Lakes and not having to build port facilities et al.

Also they have to have a pelletizing/roasting plant at the destination with the pipeline idea. Another question that comes to mine is why don't they use the wide gauge rail that is already there going to Scheff. I presume it is owned by somebody else and they already worked that out.

EC<:-}