Royal Nickel Corp reports that Tsingshan Holding, a party with whom RNC entered a strategic alliance in March 2013, is currently constructing the world’s first integrated nickel pig iron (NPI) plant to use nickel sulphide concentrate as part of the stainless steel production process. This innovation offers significant potential benefits to the producers of suitable nickel sulphide concentrate feed including lower costs due to simpler processing compared to traditional smelting and refining, and greater flexibility for more potential partners and customers.

The plant is expected to begin operation within this year and represents the first time that nickel sulphide concentrate will be directly used to create stainless steel. This plant is also expected to be possibly capable of handling nickel sulphide concentrate anticipated to be produced from RNC’s Dumont nickel project.

Mark Selby, Interim President and CEO, commented, “The Tsingshan plant in China is an industry first and a positive development for projects such as Dumont. This process represents a new source of demand for nickel sulphide concentrate notably at a time when many NPI and ferronickel producers face feed shortages as a result of Indonesia’s recently implemented nickel ore export ban. We view Tsingshan’s investment in this pioneering process as a significant and positive development for the nickel sector, and for Royal Nickel.”

RNC’s principal asset is the Dumont Nickel Project strategically located in the established Abitibi mining camp, in the municipalities of Launay and Trécesson, 25 km northwest of Amos, Quebec.