Further to ElanS2's post re Muskrat Falls and the feds moneyElanS2 speaks the truth. But it goes even deeper.
A wee bit of background: The general issue for Rio Labrador is that obviously the torches require a tremendous amount of electricity. And believe what you will, but the availability of cheap power is crucial to a project like this. Which really can only be gained from hydroelectric power sources.
Rio Tinto/IOCC (and everyone else in that area) historically gets their power from the big Churchill falls generating station, and while it's hydroelectric, it's never been a particularly good deal in hydroelectric terms, because of a bad deal in the 70s that, in exchange for bailing out the project, Quebec was guaranteed the majority of the power at a set rate for half a century.
But it created a situation where there’s really no excess power, and worse, if NFLD/Lab needed more power they had to buy it back from Quebec at a bad rate.
This has made the power in Lab never particularly cheap, especially for industry.
The Importance of Muskrat Falls The Muskrat Falls (aka Lower Churchill) was developed to remedy this situation, finally getting cheaper power to NFLD/Lab and out of the control of Quebec’s hands.
But the development cost ballooned, with multi-billion $ over-runs -- creating a situation where once it came online rates would have to be increased to taxpayers (or else the development would go into default on their loans, and causing havoc for provincial budgets), and electricity rates would never be stable -- potentially going up all the time to keep paying that over-run debt.
Effect on Industry in the Area IOCC like any company wouldn't perhaps want to commit to a giant amount more of electrical usage (i.e. plasma torches) if they were going to have to overpay for that power, and with no price guarantee.
So here's what's more to the story with today's fed announcement of money to Muskrat Falls: it's partly to do with Sulphur Dioxide In PYR's June 11 NR, it stated: “In the case of Client B, the switch to plasma torches will also result in the additional benefit of significantly reducing the emission of another pollutant; sulphur dioxide (SO2).”
Source: https://www.pyrogenesis.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/2020-06-11-PyroGenesis-Signs-Second-Modelling-Contract-with-Another-Iron-Ore-Pelletization-Client.pdf Now, any switch from a fossil fuel burner to plasma would reduce sulphur dioxide, so even mentioning it was odd, but it was clearly intentional. Why?
Because it was likely in reference to a situation that IOCC is in with regards to sulphur dioxide emissions. In 2017, the Government of Canada mandated a performance agreement for the iron ore pellet sector in Canada to reduce air pollutants, specially sulphur dioxide. The agreement has a deadline of 2026.
The two signees of the document?
Iron Ore Company of Canada (Rio Tinto) at Labrador City, and ArcelorMittal Mining Canada G.P. at Port-Cartier Quebec.
Of course using bunker fuel as they currently do would have them creating very high levels of sulphur dioxide, comparatively. Plasma would go a long way to helping IOCC meet those government SO2 reduction goals, hence why PYR called it out in that June NR.
And so with many other pieces of data it's more evidence that client B is Rio.
In describing the client in that June NR, the first paragraph states: “Client B has over 100 burners in its existing facilities.” Of those two signees to the government agreement...
- ArcellorMittal Quebec has two production lines. That’s only 40 – 50 burners. (The average induration furnace has 20 burners, and some furnaces have up to 28 burners.) Source:
https://www.transformerlavenir.com/en/facilities/amem-facilities/the-pellet-plant/ - whereas the Iron Ore Company of Canada Labrador has six production lines, for 120+ burners. Source:
https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/labrador-iron-ore-royalty-corporation-results-for-the-third-quarter-ended-september-30-2020-839194488.html So this brings us to today and potentially the real impact. No doubt at times IOCC Labrador was saying to the government, look boys, you made us sign that document, and we want to meet those sulphur reduction goals, but we can't do it with the current instability in the electrical supply and price. We'll need some certainty there
So the feds stepping in today with cash:
1/ stops taxpayer rates from having to go up
2/ keeps the development out of insolvency and the loans secure
3/ and provides assurances to industry (like IOCC) of available power and stable pricing, so that they can now move forward with planned projects.
Which of course allows IOCC to meet those signed sulphur dioxide reduction targets by upgrading, among other things, to electrical power torches and away from bunker diesel. So a win / win / win. Etc.
Source for pellet climate agreement:
https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/environmental-performance-agreements/iron-ore-pellet-sector-overview/agreement.html