Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc. officials were on hand today in Hammond, Ind., for the grand opening of the $90 million rail facility and warehouse at the Hammond Regional Distribution Center. This structure can hold more than 100,000 tons of potash and with this capacity, PotashCorp says the distribution center is like having a mini mine in the Midwest.
“It improves our ability to efficiently deliver potash to our U.S. market,” says Bob Felgenhauer, PotashCorp’s vice president of transportation and distribution. “Building this facility shows our customers we are committed to meeting their needs and are willing to invest in facilities to do that.”
The warehouse, completed in April 2016, is equipped with state-of-the-art product-handling equipment that can unload railcars two to three times faster than a typical potash warehouse. This helps handle increased capacity from PotashCorp’s Saskatchewan mines, which recently saw multi-billion dollar expansions.
The first phase of the Hammond project, which added 14 miles of track to the rail yard, was completed in 2012. This created space for up to 1,000 railcars to stand loaded and ready to roll. In bypassing potential bottlenecks at the busy Chicago rail corridor 25 miles to the north, PotashCorp said it can forward position material and significantly reduce delivery times to customers.