Cliffs buys Canadian chromite deposits

Cliffs Natural Resources of Cleveland, Ohio, US is buying three chromite deposits in northern Ontario, Canada from Freewest Resources Canada and will spend USD 4 million to start development of a ferrochrome plant along the north shore of Lake Superior in Canada. Ferrochrome is an essential element in stainless steel making and currently is imported in North America from suppliers in South Africa and several other countries. Cliffs management says the plan is to process Freewest’s chromite assets – the Black Thor, Black Label and Big Daddy deposits – to generate up to 2 million metric tns/yr of high-grade concentrate. That material then will be processed into up to 800,000 metric tons of ferrochrome when the smelting operation opens in 2015. Cliffs expects commercial plans to bring the deposit to market will include construction of the open-pit mine and mine-site processing facility, as well as a remote electric-arc furnace to further process the ore into high-grade ferrochrome.
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