Mitsui Mining & Smelting to Cut Zn Output by 15.8% in 1H

Mitsui Mining & Smelting announced on the firm plans to reduce the zinc ingot output by 15.8% to 92,900 tonnes in first half of fiscal 2011 started in April from same period of fiscal 2010. The production decreases when Hachinohe Smelting in Aomori, in which Mitsui Mining & Smelting has around 85% share, stopped the operation since the major earthquake. Mitsui Mining & Smelting plans to reduce the lead output by 1.4% to 27,700 tonnes in the first half. The firm plans to reduce the output to 7.7 tonnes of gold and 92.8 tonnes of silver from 8.1 tonnes and 128.1 tonnes respectively in same period of fiscal 2010 due to lower material grade.

The firm expects Hachinohe Smelting will resume the operation by early June. The smelter is completing the detailed damage check. The smelter repairs the damage along with planned maintenance, which was planned in late March as regular maintenance in every 3-year. The smelter tries to keep the shipment from inventory, which was built preparing for the planned maintenance, while the firm tries to secure additional metal by importing and by adjusting shipping schedule for export.

Mitsui Mining & Smelting tries to cover the production loss as much as possible by increasing the production at Kamioka Mining & Smelting in Gifu and Hikoshima Smelting in Yamaguchi.

Mitsui Mining & Smelting expects the lead production damage is minimum thanks to built inventory of crude lead despite of stoppage of Hachinohe Smelting while Hachinohe Smelting usually sends the intermediate material to lead refinery, Takehara in Hiroshima.

Mitsui Mining & Smelting announced on Monday the firm resumed a part of copper foil production at the special foil division in Saitama. The foil operation restarted the limited operation on April 2 but the production was only in holiday when local power supplier doesn’t plan controlled blackout program in holiday. The plant keeps the operation when local power supplier decided to terminate the blackout program. The plant is still making production plan in and after summer due to uncertainty of power supply under the short supply power issue.