Tag Archives: Fabiano Carvalho Filho

Vale introduces Agera, the Sustainable Sand business

Environmental, Mining services, Sustainable mining, Water management, , , , , ,

Vale has announced the introduction of Agera – a company created to develop and expand its Sustainable Sand business.

Based in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, Agera receives the sand produced from the treatment of tailings generated by Vale’s iron ore operations in the state and promotes its commercialisation and distribution. The new company also invests in research and development (R&D) of new solutions for the product.

Sustainable Sand began to be produced by Vale in 2021 after seven years of research, as a substitute for sand extracted from the environment. Since then, around 900,000 t of the product have already been sent to the construction sector and road paving projects. The expectation is to sell 1 Mt this year and 2.1 Mt by 2024.

Fabiano Carvalho Filho, Vale’s Business Development Director, said: “We created Agera with the aim of scaling a business that is helping us to reduce the use of dams and piles in Minas Gerais, as well as helping to replace natural sand, which is often extracted predatorily from river beds. The creation of Agera is strongly linked to our strategy of promoting circular mining, which means strengthening the concepts of the circular economy in mining, associating economic development with better use of natural resources.”

Established about a year ago under the provisional name of Co-Log, Agera projects annual sales revenue of BRL18 million ($3.6 million) by 2023. Today, it has seven customer service points and stocks material in the Brazilian states of Minas Gerais and Espírito Santo. The company has contracts with seven road hauliers and three rail freight providers. The company currently serves more than 80 manufacturing units in seven segments (concrete, precast, mortar, artifacts, cement, textured paints and pavement) and is investing in research to expand its operations in other applications, such as red ceramics.

Fábio Cerqueira, Agera’s CEO, said: “We are structured to accelerate the development of sustainable products and materials, meeting the specific requirements of the market. In addition, our logistical solutions enable end-to-end efficiency to guarantee agility in the supply of sustainable sand.”

In terms of the production of Sustainable Sand, the wet processing of iron ore, which is currently used for less than 30% of Vale’s production, generates tailings, which can be disposed of in dams or piles. These tailings are basically composed of silica, the main component of sand, and iron oxides. It is a non-toxic material, which is only processed physically.

Since 2014, Vale has been investing in research to find solutions for the reuse of sand from iron ore processing, with the aim of reducing the generation of tailings. In 2021, Vale began marketing Sustainable Sand, a product intended for civil construction with 100% legal origin, high silica content and low iron content, as well as high chemical and granulometric uniformity.

The sand has been produced at the Brucutu mine in Minas Gerais since 2021. Last year, the company began small-scale production at the Viga mine and in the coming months it plans to start production at the Cauê mine, in Itabira.

In Brazil, around 330 Mt of sand are used every year in construction and industrial processes. The extraction of natural sand from riverbeds often exceeds the rate of natural replenishment and can cause irreversible environmental impacts. With the production of Sustainable Sand, it is possible to carry out 100% circular extraction, transforming a material that would otherwise be discarded into various products for the benefit of society, without compromising biodiversity, Vale says.

In addition, Sustainable Sand generates greater profitability for the construction market and industries, since the process guarantees greater control and quality of the final product, avoiding material waste and reworking during construction, the company added. Also in concrete production, Sustainable Sand helps to reduce cement consumption and CO2 emissions.

Vale’s Sustainable Sand to impact tailings generation plans

Bulk handling, Environmental, Mining industry recognition, Steel and iron ore, Sustainable mining, , , , , , , ,

The University of Queensland – through its Sustainable Minerals Institute (SMI) – and the University of Geneva recently released a report indicating that sand from the iron ore production process may contribute to solving two important environmental issues by reducing sand extracted from the natural environment and cutting the generation of mining tailings.

One of the big contributors to this report was Vale, which, itself, has developed Sustainable Sand, a co-product of iron ore processing that, instead of being disposed in piles and dams, is now being processed and transformed into a product, following the same quality controls as in its iron ore production.

This year, Vale will allocate around 1 Mt of sand between sales and donations for use in civil construction and tests in pavement, among other uses. Much of this is set to come from its Brucutu mine in Minas Gerais.

IM put some questions to Bruno Batista, Engineer at Brucutu mine, and Fabiano Carvalho Filho, Executive Manager for Ferrous Business Development, to find out more about the company’s plans for Sustainable Sand.

IM: How has Vale changed its operational practices at mine sites to make the most of the Sustainable Sand process? For instance, have mine plans or layouts been adapted to ensure it is easier to obtain and process this material?

BB: First of all, Vale has done deep research about the technical potential for iron ore tailings and the mineral processing to obtain sand from them. Despite sand generation sharing existing assets deployed for the exploration of iron ore, it is important to highlight that Vale had to obtain the mineral and environmental licence to produce, sell and donate sand. The use of new technologies for greater recovery of iron ore have been installed in our operations and, as a result, we will have better quality sandy tailings. In some cases, it was necessary to implement new stages of concentration, classification and filtration so that it was possible to produce quality sand that met market requirements. We did change the quality control, treating sand as a product, with specification, daily analysis and process adjustment in order to meet it.

IM: I think it was 250,000 t of sand set aside for sale or donation to be used in concrete, mortar, cement and road pavement last year, another 1 Mt/y this year and 2 Mt/y in 2023. What are the longer-term goals for Sustainable Sand and – at the same time – how is this impacting your tailings handling plans?

BB: Vale’s objective is to enable more sustainable mining. The figures you mention are correct. Our pace of production in the long term will depend upon several factors, such as logistics capacity and market availability. Sustainable Sand is one of the initiatives to reduce the generation of tailings. Other initiatives are being developed as such as dry concentration and tailings filtering.

IM: Is there a balance to be had here with using sand for dry-stacked tailings purposes – increasing the stability of your tailings infrastructure – and donating/selling it for other uses? Is this what could potentially put a ‘cap’ on your Sustainable Sand production for sale/donation?

BB: Coarse tailings are destined for sand production and also for dry stacking. To increase more significantly sand production there are some challenges, such as logistics capacity and market availability. Vale is advancing and we should forecast a production of 2 Mt in 2023. We are also studying applications for the ultrafine material, so we would need less coarse tailings for dry stacking.

IM: Aside from the 425-m-long road at the Cauê mine, in Itabira, and the Pico Block Factory, what other applications will the sand have?

FCF: At the moment, the focus is on the construction market, mainly concrete, mortar and cement, as it has the largest production scale and is already being sold to by Vale, and road pavement, in which we are advancing our research. Vale has a portfolio of more than 20 initiatives for the use of tailings from mining. These initiatives are the result of partnerships with universities, research centres and other companies. These are initiatives that encompass several industries, focused on civil construction, chemical industry and automotive, among others. The initiatives are at different stages of maturity and the future of the projects still depends on progress in the research being carried out.

IM: Sand is the planet’s most mined material, so what does Vale plan to do with this Sustainable Sand process to reduce the environmental impact of the wider mining industry?

FCF: Vale’s objective is to enable more sustainable mining. The UNEP report (2022), in which the Vale Sand Case has been studied, shows that substituting naturally-sourced sand with ore sand (sand from iron ore tailings) could potentially lead to net reductions in carbon emissions generated during sand production. The substitution of marine or riverine sand for ore sand could also lead to a reduction in ecosystem damage. Besides that, Vale Sand is a certified product, which can contribute to this particular industry.

IM: Is there potential for other iron ore mining companies using this process to reduce their own tailings generation? the process been patented?

FCF: Iron ore tailings beneficiation demands investments and technology; there are patents involved in the development of other products derived from the sand.

Vale plans significant investment in dry processing technologies, Reuters says

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Vale reportedly plans to invest $2.5 billion on, predominantly, dry processing technology as it looks to draw a line under the recent tailings dam failures that have occurred at its Brazil operations.

Reuters, citing emailed responses from Vale’s Director of Ferrous Planning and Development, Fabiano Carvalho Filho, said the Brazil-based miner would spend the amount over the next five years, with the funds mainly used to convert Vale’s Carajas iron ore mining operations in the northern portion of the country to 100% dry tailings facilities.

The news came on the same day the company released its March quarter financial results, which saw the miner report a $1.6 billion loss on the back of the recent Brumadinho dam rupture.

The company is looking to increase its dry processing operations to 70% of its overall iron ore output by the end of 2023, from 60% currently, according to the Reuters report.

Of the 17 processing lines of Plant 1 at Carajas, 11 are already using dry technologies and the remaining six wet lines will be converted by 2022, Carvalho Filho reportedly said.

In addition, the investments will also go towards two projects in Minas Gerais – one for a new iron ore processing complex, with the other focused on restarting a previously operational mine – the news agency said.

The dry processing spend is part of an existing program under which Vale has invested almost $17.5 billion over the last decade, Carvalho Filho told Reuters, adding that the investments were not directly tied to the recent tailings dam spills at the Brumadinho and Mariana dams.