Rio de Janeiro—Vale SA produced 101,000 mt of potash at its Taquari-Vassouras mine in Segipe state in the second quarter of this year, a nearly 10 percent reduction on the year-ago’s output of 111,000 mt. The company cited an unscheduled maintenance stoppage at the Taquari-Vassouras beneficiation plant, as well as the mining of a lower grade ore, for the decline. First-half 2016 production was 211,000 mt, some 9 percent down on the year-ago’s 219,000 mt. Vale produced 969,000 mt of phosphate rock at its Brazilian operations in the second quarter, 12 percent less than the 1.1 million mt produced in the same-year earlier quarter. The company attributed the downturn to unscheduled maintenance stoppages at the Catalão, Tapira, and Cajati plants in the second quarter and the stoppage of the Patos de Minas plant since July 2015. After the unscheduled maintenance stoppages, all of these plants have now resumed operations. Six-month phosphate rock production at Vale’s Brazilian operations fell 24 percent year-on-year to 1.67 million, down from 2.2 million mt. Production at Bayóvar in Peru, in which Vale owns a 40 percent stake, was 836,000 mt in the second quarter, 17 percent lower than in the second quarter last year due to an unscheduled maintenance stoppage at the concentration plant. First-half production slipped 8 percent year-on-year, falling to 1.75 million mt. Vale in the second quarter produced 454,000 mt of SSP (470,000 mt Q2 2015), 246,000 mt of TSP (240,000 mt ), 235,000 mt of MAP (287,000 mt), and 114,000 mt of DCP (84,000 mt). Six-month production of SSP was 780,000 mt (934,000 mt in 1H 2015), 459,000 mt of TSP (471,000 mt), 493,000 mt of MAP (578,000 mt), and 236,000 mt of DCP (222,000 mt). Ammonium nitrate production was 128,000 mt in the second quarter, compared with 122,000 mt a year earlier. The production uptick reflected a scheduled maintenance stoppage at the Cubatão plant in April 2015. Vales reports its Cutatão ammonia plant remains under “corrective maintenance,” a process begun in the second quarter. As a result, Vale’s six-month ammonia output fell to 66,000 mt, down from the year-ago 90,000 mt.
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