The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Teck deals with maintenance, unruly weather at Alaska mine North of 60 Mining News – October 29, 2021
The Red Dog Mine is on pace to produce more than 1.1 billion pounds of zinc and 200 million lb of lead during 2021.
After delays related to late ice conditions and significant weather-related interruptions in July and August, Teck expects to ship all Red Dog concentrates stored at this facility this year.
Teck Resources Ltd. Oct. 27 reported that the Red Dog Mine produced 378,000 metric tons (833.3 million pounds) of zinc during the first months of 2021, a roughly 10% increase over the 344,600 metric tons (759.7 million lb) of the galvanizing metal produced at the midway point of 2020.
Likewise, the Northwest Alaska mine produced 78,700 metric tons (173.5 million lb) of lead during the three quarters of 2021, an 11% increase over the 71,100 metric tons (156.7 million lb) produced during the same period last year.
Red Dog's third quarter zinc production, however, was down compared to both the previous quarter and the same period of 2020. During the third quarter of this year, the Alaska operation produced 118,000 metric tons (260.1 million lb) of zinc, which is a 16% drop from the 140,300 metric tons (309.3 million lb) produced during the second quarter and down 11% from the 132,300 metric tons (291.7 million lb) produced during the third quarter of 2020.
Teck attributes this decrease in zinc production primarily to lower mill throughput and recoveries due to unplanned maintenance.
The mill at Red Dog processed 1.02 million metric tons of ore during the third quarter averaging 14.3% zinc and 4.5% lead, compared to 1.09 metric tons of ore averaging 14.3% zinc and 4% lead during the same period of 2020. This year's third quarter zinc recoveries were 80.9%, compared to 84.5% last year. Likewise, lead recoveries were 53.5%, compared to 60.8% last year.
The Red Dog shipping season, which got underway on July 19 following delays due to weather and ice conditions, is expected to be completed by early November. Despite significant weather-related shipping delays in July and August, Teck expects to ship all zinc concentrates from Red Dog during the current shipping season.
Teck continues to anticipate that Red Dog will produce between 510,000 and 530,000 metric tons (1.12 billion and 1.17 billion lb) of zinc and between 90,000 and 100,000 metric tons (198.4 million and 220.5 million lb) of lead during 2021.
Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.
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