OREANDA-NEWS. December 31, 2010. Metalloinvest Holding, the largest iron ore producer in Russia and CIS, announced that it has signed an agreement with the Ural Heavy Machinery Plant (Uralmashzavod) on supplies of the equipment and construction of the indurating machine #3 complex at Mikhailovsky Mining and Processing plant (MGOK). The indurating machine #3 complex should become the largest pelletizing plant in Russia.

The new pelletizing plant will produce 5 million tonnes of high quality iron ore pellets for blast furnace production. Investments to the project amount to 13 billion rubles (nearly USD 420 million). The facility is planned to be launched in the first half of 2013.

Within the frames of the agreement Uralmashzavod shall produce and supply equipment as well as launch the whole pelletizing complex.  The project provides that modern and reliable machines of high power consumption efficiency will be installed at the plant. These machines would allow decreasing production costs and well as reducing environmental pollution. All the designed specification figures comply with the world’s best standards.

After implementation of the of indurating machine #3 complex, MGOK’s pellets production capacity would be one and a half times increased. The new machine is supposed to meet growing demand for the high quality iron ore materials from Russian steel producers mainly.

“We consider this project as one of Metalloinvest’s investment programme priorities. We started the project in 2007 but in view of the crisis we postponed it. Today we see strong growth in demand for pellets from Russian and foreign steel producers and we are sure that all the additional volumes will be sold. Important advantage of this project is that it provides minimum environmental pollution. Innovative technical solutions to be used in our equipment would secure 20-30 percent decrease of the polluting emissions compared to the existing machines produced in Russia and abroad,” commented Eduard Potapov, Chief Executive Officer of the Metalloinvest Management Company LLC .

Along with Uralmashzavod the following Russian companies work on the project:

- Tsentrogiproruda Designing Institute LLC  (general contractor for project documentation);

- UNIVERSSTROYLUX LLC  (general contractor for construction works);

- URALMECHANOBR LLC  (general contractor for detailed design).

Mikhailovsky Mining and Processing Plant is the second largest iron ore miner in Russia. MGOK ranks the country first in terms of its product range, producing iron ore pellets (including iron-rich pellets), concentrate and sinter-feed ore. The explored ore reserves of Mikhailovsky GOK exceed 11 billion tonnes. Mikhailovsky GOK’s customers are the largest steel producing plants of Russia, CIS, Europe and China.