Iron Ore

Sky’s the limit as Rio Tinto reaches for stars
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One of Rio’s driverless trucks in the Kimberley.

After developing the world’s biggest robots, Rio Tinto is pondering how those same technological breakthroughs might transform other planets.

The mining giant has pioneered a host of innovations in Western Australia’s iron ore-rich Pilbara with autonomous drill rigs, trucks and mile-long driverless trains now part of the landscape.

Rio has something of a headstart on its rivals.

Among its board members is Megan Clark. After heading up Australia’s prestigious CSIRO, she took on an arguably even bigger role as the first leader of the Australian Space Agency.

With Australia lagging many international peers in interplanetary work, Ms Clark aims to triple the value of the nation’s space industry by 2030.

Techniques pioneered by mining companies at the cutting edge of minerals extraction could be a valuable learning tool for Australia as the world pushes into new space exploration.

“Rio Tinto is developing autonomous drilling and that’s the sort of thing you will need to do on Mars and on the moon,” Ms Clark says. “While we’re drilling for iron ore in the Pilbara, on the moon they might be looking for basic resources to survive like soils, water and oxygen.”

The autonomous rigs at Rio are responsible for carrying out drilling on the floor of the company’s various open pits, carrying out the monotonous work of drilling holes for explosives.

Controlled out of Rio’s remote operations centre in Perth, they deliver better consistency and better uptime than the manned rigs.

Rio says it is now collaborating with the space industry to see how its mining technology could be used on other planets.

In addition to autonomous drills, other transferable technology from the mining industry may include remote rovers — used to shift materials around the jagged terrain of mine sites — and mirroring the similar surface of some planets.

Elsewhere in Western Australia, Woodside has partnered with NASA on a robonaut called Rick, which will transfer skills learnt on the International Space Station to Woodside’s offshore oil rigs.

“You can absolutely see this theme of ‘on Earth in space and in space on Earth’ as being how Australia continues to lead and form partnerships that have never formed before. This is about each industry learning from each other,” Ms Clark says.

In addition to robot-controlled drill rigs, full automation of the iron ore sector is also close to reality after Rio last month said it had successfully deployed AutoHaul, establishing the world’s largest robot and first automated heavy-haul, long-distance rail network.

It means Rio is also closer to realising a potential billion-dollar-profit boost from the introduction of driverless trains in Western Australia.

Rio’s $940 million AutoHaul program is focused on automating trains transporting iron ore from the Pilbara to port facilities.

The miner operates about 200 locomotives on more than 1700km of track in the Pilbara, transporting iron ore from 16 mines to four port terminals.

The average return trip of these trains is about 800km, with the average journey cycle — including loading and dumping — taking about 40 hours.

Rio unveiled its robot trains in 2008, but the global financial crisis stalled those plans until 2012.
Perry Williams, Senior Business Writer
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/bu...s/news-story/8557a77d7bb37d2e9a538ab13d64eacf
 
themickey said:
Will be interesting to know later on whether there was any signs of fault in the dam known prior to the rupture. Bad weather doesn't look like a factor.
It's a safety issue, will be interesting to know if human incompetence with their health & safety department.
More...
Brazil arrests 8 Vale employees in alleged cover-up in dam disaster
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Sal Paulo | Brazilian police arrested eight employees of mining firm Vale on Friday, accused by state prosecutors of covering up weaknesses at a dam that collapsed and likely killed more than 300 people.

Police also executed 14 search warrants as part of the probe of the country's deadliest mining disaster, prosecutors in the mining state of Minas Gerais said.

The arrests and search warrants targeted employees of Vale as well as German auditing firm TÜV SÜD, which had certified the dam as stable.

The arrests deepened a festering crisis for Vale, the world's largest iron ore mining company, whose share price has tumbled 18 per cent since the disaster and subsequent civil and criminal probes.

The dam in the town of Brumadinho, which contained tailings, the mud-like byproducts of mining, burst on Januaury 25, killing at least 166 people. Almost 200 more are still missing.

"The eight Vale employees .. had full knowledge of the situation of instability in the dam and each one of them, as part of their job, also had the power and ability to adopt measures for either stabilising the structure or evacuating areas at risk," a judge in Minas Gerais wrote in an arrest warrant, issued in response to a petition from the state prosecutor's office.

Vale said in a securities filing it was cooperating with the investigation.
The latest warrants followed the arrest last month of five Vale and TÜV SÜD employees, who were released by a higher court ruling on February 5.

The most senior Vale employees arrested on Friday were Joaquim Toledo, Vale executive director of geotechnical operations, who led the team given the task of monitoring the dam's stability, and Alexandre Campanha, Vale executive corporate director of geotechnicals.
No top Vale executives have been arrested.

Prosecutors alleged that Campanha pressured Makoto Namba, a TÜV SÜD engineer who was arrested and later released, "to sign a declaration that the dam was stable, or risk losing the contract".

Minas Gerais prosecutors also sought the arrests of four TÜV SÜD employees, but the judge denied the request.

The prosecutors alleged "the four employees of TÜV SÜD participated in a scheme, sponsored by Vale, to make up technical numbers, and falsely pledge the stability of the dam, which allowed for the situation of risk to be perpetuated".

Neither Campanha nor Toledo could be reached immediately for comment. TÜV SÜD declined to comment.

Chief executive officer Fabio Schvartsman said on Thursday, in response to questions from lawmakers, that the company's safety procedures had not worked.

Reuters reported earlier this week that Vale had seen an internal report last year that the dam had a heightened risk of rupturing. Chief financial officer Luciano Siani said on Tuesday that Vale senior management were never shown the documents.
Reuters
https://www.afr.com/business/mining...leged-coverup-in-dam-disaster-20190216-h1bc3u
 
Rio Tinto, Vale aim to elbow BHP from BlueScope supply.
Bluescope is trialing new suppliers of iron ore for its Port Kembla blast furnance.
Australia's biggest steelmaker needs 3.3 million tonnes of iron ore a year and BHP rivals Rio Tinto and Vale are trying to muscle in.

Australia's biggest steelmaker, BlueScope, could end up using iron ore transported 15,000km from Brazil as feed stock for its Port Kembla steelworks instead of iron ore from Western Australia, as it pursues much more competitive supply arrangements in a global market.

BlueScope is quietly testing different shipments of iron ore from a variety of players in its one remaining blast furnace at Port Kembla, on the outskirts of Wollongong. The Port Kembla steelworks needs about 3.3 million tonnes of iron ore for the 3.2 million tonnes of steel is produces annually.

Brazilian iron ore group Vale is among the companies that have been in early negotiations over the potential shipping of iron ore to Port Kembla. But BHP's main rival Rio Tinto is pushing hard to muscle in, as a long-term exclusive supply and transport agreement between BlueScope and its former parent BHP ends on June 30 after 17 years. Rio has already been supplying trial batches in a push to win the work, with shipments from the port of Dampier in Western Australia.
More at....... https://t.co/y1z03aw29K
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China could slash its iron ore imports 40 per cent as its Government winds down its stimulus of an overpriced housing sector, which would have disastrous consequences for Australian iron ore producers, a conference in Perth was told yesterday.

J Capital partner and iron ore and steel analyst Tim Murray said China’s annual iron ore imports could fall from about a billion tonnes now to about 600 million tonnes in as little as five years.

He said predicting such a quick decline was not a common view, but other research had predicted the same fall but over 10 years.

Mr Murray said the reduction in the volume of Chinese imports would also cause a big fall in the price and hit Australia hard.

“Well, we’re the biggest supplier to China, so we’ll be the biggest loser. It’s obvious,” he said.

Australia earned $61 billion from iron ore in fiscal 2018 and 83 per cent went to China, according to the Department of Industry.

Speaking on the sidelines of the Global Iron Ore and Steel Forecast Conference in Perth yesterday, Mr Murray said monetary stimulus had rapidly driven Chinese property prices beyond the reach of many buyers.

“The Government is determined not to let property prices rise and has a very clear statement that houses are for living in, not for investment,” he said.

Mr Murray, who lived in China for 19 years, said flatter property prices would reduce construction, and therefore steel use.

He said infrastructure construction would not replace the property sector’s reduction in steel demand.

It used less steel and in many areas China had enough infrastructure, and in some cases too much.

Mr Murray said importers would mainly feel the reduction in iron ore demand as most Chinese miners were State-owned and the country wanted to maintain a degree of self-sufficiency.

Fortescue Metals Group chief operating officer Greg Lilleyman said he did not see a big reduction in Australia’s iron ore exports to China over the next decade.

“We have a good view, and a very strong view of ongoing demand for our products in China,” he said.

Mr Murray said an escalation of the trade dispute between the US and China could hurt Chinese export volumes and its demand for steel.

The Sydney-based analyst said while some predicted the iron price would rise to $US100 a tonne, he thought it would stay in the $US80 to $90-a-tonne band for some months and slide later in the year.

Mines and Petroleum Minister Bill Johnston said the State Government in preparing its next Budget would not assume current high iron ore prices, due in part to the Vale dam disaster in Brazil, would continue.

Another trend that will reduce Chinese iron ore consumption is the increasing amount of steel made from scrap using electric arc furnaces.

Mr Murray said this would take some time to have a significant effect as large amounts of scrap may not become available until buildings built in the early days of the property boom in the 1990s are scrapped.
https://thewest.com.au/business/min...as-property-pumping-wound-back-ng-b881141959z
 
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'It's game on': BHP hit with record $7b claim in UK over deadly dam collapse
BHP has been hit with the biggest damages claim in British legal history, in a $US5 billion group action lawsuit over the 2015 Fundão dam collapse in Brazil.

The full claim was served on the Anglo-Australian miner in a Liverpool court on Tuesday, along with harrowing accounts of the suffering caused by the dam’s collapse.

SPG Law partner Tom Goodhead said his firm was acting for 235,000 Brazilian claimants including municipal governments, utility companies, indigenous tribes and the Catholic Church, and had compiled 6.3 million pages of evidence showing their loss and suffering.

All the documents have been served on BHP in the UK and Australia, and the company now has four weeks to respond..............

.........BHP is also facing a class-action lawsuit from shareholders in Australia over the dam failure, over claims it failed to disclose the risk of the dam’s failure to the stock market and misled investors.
Although the disaster ranks as Brazil’s worst environmental catastrophe, the collapse of a Vale-operated tailings dam in the town of Brumadinho in January 2019 left a higher death toll, estimated at 300 people.
https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe...over-deadly-dam-collapse-20190508-p51l24.html
 
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Business News
September 21, 2019 / 7:11 PM / Updated 34 minutes ago
China traders cut back Iran iron ore purchases ahead of tariff hike
Min Zhang, Shivani Singh

BEIJING (Reuters) - China has taken fewer shipments of iron ore from Iran over August and September, according to Refinitiv Eikon data, as additional export tariffs due to be imposed by Tehran have dampened risk appetites in the world’s biggest steelmaker.

Iran’s deputy minister of industries said earlier this month that exports of all steelmaking raw materials will be slapped with a 25% tariff to meet demand in domestic steel industry, according to Iranian state-backed media Press TV on Sept. 9.

The tariffs, which will cover various products from Iran’s iron mills, including iron ore and concentrates, will come into effect from Sept. 23, the Press TV report said.

Iran shipped 319,920 tonnes of iron ore to China in August, down 37.8% from July and 23.4% lower than a year earlier, according to Reuters calculations based on vessel-tracking and port data compiled by Refinitiv.

In September so far, China has taken 129,534 tonnes of iron ore from Iran, according to the same calculations and data.

“Not many traders buy iron ore from Iran because of the U.S. sanctions,” said Zhao Yu, an analyst with Huatai Futures, adding that the freight charges are also high.

Two Chinese traders told Reuters they could only use cash and telegraphic transfer as payment methods, as it was “too sensitive” to go through banks for transactions with Iran.

“The main advantage of Iran ore is it’s low cost,” said a trader who buys 2 million to 3 million tonnes of iron ore from Iran a year.

“If (Iran’s) prices go up (from the tariffs), they can be totally replaced by other mainstream ores,” he said when asked why China did not buy more before the tariffs go into effect.

Also, the tariffs were announced on a short notice, he said.

“There’s not enough time to buy, load and clear customs.”

The trader said his company was considering substituting iron ore from Africa or Southeast Asia for Iranian ore.

Iran’s Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade and customs department did not respond to requests for comment.

Iran shipped a total of 17 million tonnes of iron ore to overseas markets in the fiscal year ended March 20, 2019, according to data from the Iranian Mines and Mining Industries Development and Renovation Organization.

China, the world’s biggest iron ore market, consumes about 90% of Iran’s exports of the material. China bought 14.7 million tonnes of iron ore from Iran in 2018, accounting for 1.4% of its total imports.

“Applying such export tariffs from this month is too early,” said Keyvan Jafari Tehrani, an independent analyst of the iron and steel industry.

“I doubt whether the quantities (Iran) used to sell to China can be absorbed totally by the local market at the beginning.”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...-purchases-ahead-of-tariff-hike-idUSKBN1W608L
 
Hey @themickey. Are you trading iron ore on DCE? We added DCE connectivity recently on the TT platform and I haven't run across many IO traders. I'd love to chat at some point if you care to.
 
Hi Patrick. I trade mining stocks, I believe the ASX has more listed mining companies than any other exchange and as I live in Perth Western Australia probably in the global mining centre of action. I don't trade futures or options, just stocks. And I just follow what is hot. I write my own algos, done this for years so I trade off data more so than charts.
This will be my last year of running Amibroker, now use cloud and free publicly available information which actually works better for me, I now have everything available anywhere rather than needing to sit at a trading desk.
I have been trading + 30 years, never tired of it. So I trade nearly any mining stock on ASX plus diversify into finance, healthcare, oil, gas, anything which my algo deems priority. There is a discretionary element involved via checking some basic fundamentals, but not a lot.
 
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