On December 30, Shanxi Province-based Chinese steelmaker Taiyuan Iron and Steel (Group) Co. (TISCO) announced that construction started on its underground mining project at its Ekou iron ore mine in Shanxi on December 27.
The total investment in the project, which will need 10 years for full completion of construction work, is expected to reach RMB 1.87 billion. The Ekou mine has underground reserves of 260 million mt of iron ore, sufficient to supply TISCO with iron ore concentrate and pellets for almost 30 years. When the first phase of project begins production operations in June 2016, the annual output of raw iron ore from the underground mine is expected to be 2 million mt, while output will increase to 7.5 million mt after full completion of the project.
In 35 years of production, open mining at Ekou has already produced 130 million mt of raw iron ore.