Portugal’s mining strategy may favour copper over lithium
Portugal already has the largest copper mine in the European Union, operated by Lundin Mining.
New Millennium Iron Corp. of Calgary has chosen Outotec to provide feasibility engineering for a new pelletizing plant to be located in Pointe Noire. It will treat concentrates from New Millennium’s LabMag deposit in Labrador and its KeMag deposit in Quebec. The plant is part of the Taconite project being carried out with partner Tata Steel.
Two large – 7.5 million t/y – pellet plants are planned. Slurried concentrates from the mines will be delivered via pipeline, a cost saving alternative to rail transportation. Annual production is expected to be 15 million tonnes of pellets and 7 million tonnes of pellet feed. The company plans to produce three types of pellets: Blast furnace (BF) acid, BF fluxed, and direct reduction (DR) low silica pellets.
Outotec has begun work on the study, and New Millennium says the contract should be signed within a few weeks.
