Vale's New Caledonia nickel is no good for EV batteries any way, unless they decide to go one step further and process it into a sulfate from a laterite. We already know that the Sudbury Basin is drying up at its current depth, and just like Glencore Vale is going deeper to find more nickel sulphide. I do not know enough about the Voisey Bay deposit, nor the Thompson one mentioned below to comment. But, the general concensus, as we all know, is that nickel sulphide mines are becoming scarce, and it would appear our side of the globe will soon be gaining the advantage if the Ring of Fire proves to be bountiful; IMO.
Vale (NYSE:VALE) is struggling to offload its VNC project in New Caledonia, which has long been plagued with problems, posting US$1.3 billion in losses from 2014 to 2016. The project was over budget and late when it first opened in 2010, immediately coming up against local opposition.
The company is now considering mothballing the facility. New Caledonia is the world’s fourth-largest nickel producer, at 210,000 million tonnes a year.
http://www.vale.com/australia/EN/aboutvale/news/Pages/conheca-nossa-operacao-niquel-nova-caledonia.aspx
The basic metals produced by Vale, such as nickel, copper and cobalt, reach us by different routes of processing, which depend on a series of factors which include the type of mineral, its location and infrastructure.
As far as nickel-copper sulphide minerals which Vale extracts in Sudbury, Voisey’s Bay and Thompson, in Canada, are concerned, the first step is to extract the greatest possible quantity of those components of the mineral extracted which do not contain valuable metals – such as rocks and some types of sulphide. At this stage of extraction, the valuable metals are concentrated into a considerably reduced tonnage of material – a concentration of metal.
As regards the nickel laterite ore which Vale extracts in Sorowako, Indonesia, in Onça Puma, Brazil, and in Goro, New Caledonia, it is not possible to produce a concentrate of metal, apart from the fact that these operations deal with the complete feeding of the mineral, with the intention of recovering the valuable metals.
TM.
