Board backs process to recover iron from taconite tailings

Mining shovel
A shovel moves rock from a mining site at Hibbing Taconite. The shovel fills 240 ton mining trucks with five or six scoops.
MPR Photo/Bob Kelleher

A new process to turn taconite tailings into concentrate has won backing from the Iron Range Resources Board.

The board approved $2 million in loans and grants for the project near Keewatin.

In addition, the project will receive a $1 million loan from the Minnesota Minerals 21st Century Fund and a $1 million grant from the same fund, which were not subject board approval.

One of the owners of Magnetation, Inc., says the product could start shipping in the fourth quarter of this year.

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The project costs $5.3 million and is projected to create five full-time positions and 36 seasonal jobs within two years of starting operations.

Magnetation was established in 2006 and has refined a process to recover iron particles from existing taconite tailings basins across the Iron Range. Tailings are a byproduct of the iron mining process and have been discarded for decades in slurry form into impoundment basin.

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Information from: Mesabi Daily News, http://www.virginiamn.com