Australian iron ore producer Atlas Iron Ltd (Atlas) has shipped its first Capesize cargo of iron ore from the company's Pardoo project in Western Australia's Pilbara region to a long-term Chinese customer after loading in Fortescue Metal Group's Herb Elliot Port in Port Hedland was completed over the weekend.
Accordingly, the 149,026 wet mt iron ore is shipped to the customer, an unnamed medium-sized Chinese steel mill, who signed a long-term contract with Atlas in December.
In mid-March, Atlas entered into four long-term off-take agreements for 100 percent of its Pardoo iron ore for the next three-year period to March 31, 2012.
Atlas managing director David Flanagan said the shipment comprised the first ore from higher-grade bedded iron deposits at Pardoo, adding the miner would ship ore to its other three long-term customers in the coming months, with the next Capesize vessel slated to depart in May.
Atlas is mining at its 100 percent-owned Pardoo Iron Ore Project, located 75 kilometres by road from Port Hedland in Pilbara, and completed its first shipment of Pardoo iron ore in early December 2008. Atlas is planning to export 1 million mt during its first 12 months of operations at the Pardoo Project, growing to 3 mt per year following commissioning of the Utah Point port facility. When combined with additional export tonnages from Abydos, the company is targeting exports at an annual rate of 6 million mt by 2010, growing to 12 million mt per year by 2012.