Bauxite Operations
in the Amazon Region

The business operations of Mineração Rio do Norte in Porto Trombetas comprise the extraction of the mineral, enrichment, transport by rail, drying and finally loading onto ships for sea transport.

MRN's initial production capacity was set at 3.35 million tonnes per year. Over more than 20 years of operation, this capacity has been stepped up gradually due to the increase in demand form the market and the wide acceptance of bauxite produced by the company, in refineries around the globe. Currently, MRN has an installed production capacity of 16.3 million tonnes annually, which makes it the largest individual mining unit in the world.

Mineração Rio do Norte currently operates three mines, namely Saracá, Almeidas and Aviso. In these, the mineral deposits lie an average of 8 meters below the surface covered in thick and dense vegetation and a sterile layer composed of organic soil, clay, nodular bauxite and ferruginous laterite.

To be mined, the bauxite must be decapped. This operation is carried out in sequential fashion, in regular strips, where the dug sterile cover is deposited in the adjacent strip, where the mineral deposits have already been mined.

From the mine, the dug up mineral is transported by off-road trucks to the crushing unit, where it is crushed to a grain size of less than three inches. From there, the mineral is transported along conveyor belts to the washing, cycloning and filtering units.

After the enrichment process, there is about 27% of solid mass as bauxite waste, which is stored in waste tanks built in areas that have already been mined, in the Saracá plateau.

Once enriched, the mineral is then transported by rail from the mine area to the port, along a 28 km railway. In this operation, five trains are used, each of which with 26 carriages.

As bauxite can be sold both wet and dry, in the port area the bauxite mineral can follow one of two paths before being loaded onto ships: it either feeds the three drying ovens or goes, while still wet, to the storage area.

The port has the draft to handle ships with a capacity of approximately 60 thousand tonnes.

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