OREANDA-NEWS. March 11, 2011. Mechel (NYSE: MTL), one of the leading Russian mining and metals companies, reports that the group’s Bratsk Ferroalloy Plant began test melting of an industrial probe of quartzites from the plant’s own resource base, the Uvatsk deposit, reported the press-centre of Mechel.

The intermediate results of melting of the industrial probe of quartzites, the main raw material used in ferrosilicon production, showed that the Uvatsk deposit’s reserves are suitable for production of ferrosilicon with 65% silicon content, which is most in demand.

The test melting, which is conducted in one of the plant’s furnaces, will continue until May 2011. By that time, Bratsk Ferroalloy Plant will use some 10,000 tonnes of quartzites in its furnaces. The results, received after the entire test lot is used, will enable the determination the material’s final industrial and technological characteristics and thus make further usage of Uvatsk quartzites as efficient as possible.

“Transferring production to use of quartzites from our own deposit will not only allow the plant to be independent of external sources, but also get new qualitative measures of the final product, which will have a positive impact on the economic and industrial results of Mechel Group’s ferroalloy segment,” said Gennady Ovchinnikov, Chief Executive Officer of Mechel Ferroalloys Management Company.

Bratsk Ferroalloy Plant won the tender for the rights to utilize the subsoil plot on the Uvatsk deposit of quartzite and quartz sandstones in May 2008. The Uvatsk deposit is located in the Irkutsk Region, approximately 24 kilometers from the town of Nizhneudinsk. Industrial exploitation of the Uvatsk quartzite deposit is due to be launched in the second half of 2011, once the reserves receive state registration.