The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Jonathon Naylor Editor Hudbay's zinc plant will continue running below its capability until full production at the Lalor mine begins in two years. The company says the Flin Flon plant is now operating at 90 per cent capacity, the same as in 2012. 'The plant will run at below capacity until the Lalor mine production increases,' said Brad Lantz, head of Hudbay's Manitoba operations. 'Hudbay will be self-sufficient with domestic zinc concentrate production in 2015.' Having closed its Trout Lake and Chisel North mines after years of dwindling production, Hudbay finds itself without enough zinc to run the plant at 100 per cent. Won't buy Whereas Hudbay used to buy copper from other companies to keep its now-defunct copper smelter going at capacity, Lantz said there are no such plans for the zinc plant. The zinc plant's decreased workload has been a common topic of conversation among employees who have noticed they are less busy during their shifts. Also discussed is the state of the plant itself, with rumours of major repairs required. Lantz said repairs are indeed needed to fix the operating cells within the plant's cellhouse, but that's nothing unusual. See 'Repair...' on pg. 3 Continued from pg. 1 'As with any large industrial plant, there (are) always ongoing repairs required to ensure safe production,' he said. 'The repairs are part of the zinc plant's normal operating budget and therefore can be found in (Hudbay's) reported guidance (document).' Lantz said there is certainly no need to rebuild the zinc plant, another rumour floating around, nor relocate the complex to Snow Lake. 'There is extensive infrastructure required to operate the zinc plant, which is already in Flin Flon,' he said. At the time of its opening in 1993, the zinc plant was seen as a world-class facility _ and Lantz said that is still the case. 'The technology used in Flin Flon is still considered 'state of the art' for recovery of zinc from sulphide ores,' he said. 'Any potential upgrades in the future of the zinc plant will not change the core technologies for leaching or electrowinning.' The zinc plant directly employs 272 people. Hudbay CEO David Garofalo announced in 2011 that the company has no plans to expand the zinc plant due to production from Lalor. 'We're going to have a surplus of zinc concentrates when Lalor's up and running,' he told Flin Flon and District Chamber of Commerce two years ago. 'But right now, I'm not sure there's a case for expanding the zinc refinery because once we're through the zinc ore in Lalor, we're into very heavy copper-gold. So the zinc production actually diminishes over time.' Garofalo called the projected surplus of zinc 'kind of a temporary phenomenon.' 'So we might tough it (out) for a few years of having to place that surplus zinc (concentrate), because I don't think we could sustain the expanded capacity (at the plant),' he said at the time. Garofalo stressed the importance of the zinc plant, however, calling it 'a tremendous competitive advantage.' At that same chamber meeting, Garofalo further quashed any notion of Hudbay returning to the copper smelting business. 'The custom-smelting business is a very, very tough business,' he said. 'It's very low margin. It requires a huge capital investment up front. I think we'll create a lot more value in the ground, focusing on mining. So rebuilding the copper smelter is just not in the cards for us.' Hudbay's copper smelter closed in June 2010 after 80 years in operation _ and countless headlines about the volume of air pollution it produced.
