BlueScope today announced plans to expand its Taharoa, New Zealand, iron sands export operations through the introduction of a third shipping vessel in FY2016. BlueScope will charter a purpose built 175,000 tonne slurry loading vessel and spend a total of A$50 million spread across FY2016 to FY2018 on mining, processing and ship loading equipment.
The expansion and introduction of a third vessel will add 1.3 million tonnes per annum of export capacity to the Taharoa mine. Today's announcement, together with existing operations and the planned customer supplied second vessel which is to commence during CY2015, will increase total annual iron sands export capacity at Taharoa from 1.3 million tonnes in 2013 to approximately 4 million tonnes per annum upon commencement of the third vessel in FY2016.
Commenting on the expansion, BlueScope's Managing Director and CEO, Mr Paul O'Malley, said "With a low cost of extraction, our iron sands operations are a valuable part of BlueScope's business portfolio – making an excellent contribution to earnings from exports and providing low cost iron unit feed to New Zealand steelmaking. Operations of the third vesselare expected to achieve solid returns with annual EBIT, based on current iron ore prices and foreign exchange rates, in line with the $50 million capital to be invested2."
