Votorantim Metais Nickel Business Unit is a pioneer in the manufacturing of electrolytic nickel in Latin America. It has started operating in 1957, when it took over the Companhia Níquel Tocantins control. By that time, they started the geological studies to explore the mines located within São José do Tocantins region, nowadays the Niquelândia City, in Goiás State.
The first lot of electrolytic nickel was only produced in 1981, though, at the metallurgy plant set in São Paulo City, on the neighborhood of São Miguel Paulista.
By 1992, the electrolytic nickel production had doubled, reaching 10 thousand tons/year. Six years later, Votorantim was also working with cobalt, whose production reached 903 tons, besides 17,5 thousand tons of nickel.
In 2003, Votorantim Metais acquired Mineração Serra da Fortaleza, which is a mining industrial complex, located in Fortaleza de Minas (Minas Gerais State), with a production capacity of 10 thousand tons of nickel and 120 thousand tons of sulfuric acid per year. On that same year, the company expanded São Miguel Paulista Unit’s capacity for 20.4 thousand tons/year.
To add value to the business a new expansion phase was accomplished in 2005, demanding investments of BRL145 million, thus increasing the electrolytic nickel annual production to 27 thousand tons.
Counting on 2,377 employees, the Nickel Business Unit is among the largest 15 worldwide nickel producers, with 47% of production destined to exports – 53% meet the domestic market demand.
In 2007, the Company invested R$738 million in the Nickel Business Unit. Out of this amount, R$558 million was destined to the construction of the new Iron-Nickel production Unit, in the city of Niquelândia (Goiás State), which should start operating in 2009. The remaining investment allowed the flexibility of the energy matrix of the unit already operating in the city, with the implementation of a coke boiler.
The plant to produce Iron-Nickel will have an estimated production capacity of 42.4 thousand tons/year, with 10.6 thousand tons of contained nickel.