Iron ore transport from Northern Finland and Sweden will launch massive truck rally

Planned transportation of iron ore concentrate raises concerns in Northern Sweden

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The extensive iron ore deposits on both sides of the border between Finland and Sweden are likely to start a massive truck rally in Western Lapland.
     
Northland Resources, a European exploration and development company operating in Northern Sweden and Northern Finland, has decided to ship the iron ore concentrate produced in Western Lapland to China and other Asian countries through the deepwater port of Narvik in Norway.
      The company abandoned the apparently almost-certain alternative of shipping the ore concentrate from the Port of Ajos in Kemi, in Finland.
      According to this option, the ore would have been conveyed along a railway track from Kolari to Kemi. The track would have been electrified.
     
According to the new plan, a number of special oversized 170-ton iron ore trucks would run from Pajala, in Sweden, to the railway station of Svappavaara at intervals of 10 minutes.
      From there the ore would be transported further by train to the Port of Narvik, in Norway. People living in the region are opposed to such truck transportations.
      ”The environmental impact evaluation of inland transportations is still pending in Sweden. The Narvik option would save the company some seven dollars per ton. In addition, the port of Narvik can handle up to 300,000 dwt vessels, while the Kemi harbour could give access to only 55,000 dwt ore carriers”, says Pekka Veisto, the Managing Director of Northland’s Finnish arm.
      Production is expected to commence in 2012 at the Tapuli iron mine in the municipality of Pajala, just across the border in Sweden. Later on, the production is to expand to Hannukainen in the Finnish municipality of Kolari, where Northland Resources is to establish a second mine.
     
The first loads from the enrichment plant at Kaunisvaara in Pajala are to depart at the beginning of 2013.
      Initially, approximately five milion tons of iron ore concentrate will be transported to Asian manufacturers per year. After the mine in Hannukainen has been established, the annual figure will be approximately seven million tons.
      In comparison, the amount of iron pellets transported by trains from Kostomuksha in Russia to the Rautaruukki plant in the coastal city of Raahe has been around 2 to 3 million tons per year.
     
”After the Narvik decision, we will now be doing everything in our power to ensure that the annual 2 million tons of iron ore concentrate from the Hannukainen mine would be transported through the Port of Kemi. It should be the only sensible option already for environmental reasons alone, as there is an existing railway track to the neighbourhood of Hannukainen”, says Simo Rundgren, the Project Manager of the Meänmaa project.
      The purpose of the project is to coordinate the development in the neighbouring municipalities of Kolari and Pajala, and for example to facilitate the establishment of the mining project.
     
According to Veisto, Northland Resources has not made any decision on the iron ore transportations from Hannukainen nor on any potential truck rally on the Finnish side of the border.
      ”Another option would be to ship the iron ore concentrate from Hannukainen through the Port of Kokkola instead of Kemi”, Veisto notes.
      ”All large-scale track improvement plans have now been suspended. The electrification of the railway track would have cost approximately EUR 50 million”, says Director Kari Ruohonen from the Finnish Transport Agency.
      If iron ore deliveries had started, the Kolari railtrack would have become the third busiest track section in Finland.


Links:
  Geological Survey of Finland: Hannukainen
  Northland Resources
  Northland news release 21.7.2010
  Finnish Transport Agency

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