LauraB
I reckon that the following: "Chromite fines reaching Nakina by pipeline would not impede KWG's ability to reduce the chromite. The de-watered chromite fines can be fed directly into the gas-fired pre-reduction process for ferroalloy production with conventional pelletising offering significantly reduced CO2 emission."
came from the reports (links given, but I have not verified). Anyhow, the slurry pipeline is certainly an attractive option. The cost would not be exhorbitant. A guess would be no more than $500M based on the costs of similar slurry pipelines. We all worry about the environment, not only the "environmentalists". There are many ways that a project could be made environmental-friendly. For example,
- in the quote above de-watered chromite fines can be put through a dryer using "waste heat" from the furnace operation, before sending it in the furnace to improve the conversion efficiency;
- similarly the waste heat could be used to make steam, either for direct heating or producing electricity for local consumption and beyond;
- the water can be recycled (pumped back) to reduce the amount of water used;
- the CO2 could be captured, stored for use elsewhere. One current application is its use in the oil industry to extract more oil out of existing oil wells to reduce fracking operation;
- CO2 has been used in greenhouse operation to improve plant growth and production for years.
Perhaps we should drink more beer and carbonated liquids to hold back CO2 . Kidding aside, there is nothing wrong with being environmentally concious, as long as our view and action are not extreme to a degree that any development would be opposed, at all cost, just for the sake of conservation (keeping things the way they are). Nature is quite brutal, and once in a while it would act up and change our landscape in a big way in one swoop, e.g. volcanic activities would produce all kinds of toxic gases over thousands of km.
Enough philosophy for the day!
goldhunter
