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FRANKFURT, Sept 28 (Reuters) – German potash miner K+S said on Friday that limits to waste water discharge into the river Werra near its main German fertiliser production site caused a hit of about 80 million euros ($93 million) on third-quarter earnings after a summer drought lowered river water levels.
As a result of the hit to earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), the group’s previous full-year guidance for 660 to 740 million euros in EBITDA will be revised on Nov. 15, when full third-quarter results are due for publication, K+S said in a statement.
Production at the Wintershall and Hattorf mines has resumed on Friday and output from the larger Werra mine network in central Germany should return to full capacity by Oct.1.
Further outages are unlikely but cannot be ruled out for the remainder of the year, K+S said.
Transportation of considerable amounts of waste water to offsite storage basins will likely cause extra costs over the next few months because river levels have not yet normalised despite recent rainfall, it added.
K+S first flagged limits on potash output last month.
When the river water runs low, waste water discharge is stopped for environmental reasons to keep salt concentration in the river at acceptable levels.
($1 = 0.8575 euros)
(Reporting by Ludwig Burger; Editing by Maria Sheahan)
