Horizonte Minerals signs $135 million equipment contracts for Brazil nickel project

Trial mining at Horizonte Minerals’ Araguaia nickel-cobalt project in Brazil. Credit: Horizonte Minerals.

Horizonte Minerals said on Thursday that it had signed $135 million in contracts with machinery suppliers for the Araguaia nickel project in Brazil.

The London-listed miner expects the equipment to begin arriving in the northern Pará state, where the project is located, in October, with operations scheduled to begin in 2024, said Horizonte’s head of finance, Tiago Miranda.

The Araguaia project, which Horizonte acquired from Glencore in 2015, will initially produce up to 14,500 tonnes of nickel per year, but this figure could reach 29,000 tonnes after a second production line comes online in 2027, the company said.

Late last year, Horizonte secured a $633 million financing package to develop the project.

Total capital expenditure for the construction of the first production line is estimated at $500 million, according to the company, which plans to use the additional funds as working capital and to finance the second line.

(By Rafaella Barros; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

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