Minnesota means iron meaning — in a big way

Iron mining Minnesota style is industry done large. XL doesn't even come close. Try XXXXXL.

Ore from Minnesota's famed Iron Range comes from huge pits — miles across and hundreds of feet deep. The ore is freed from taconite, one of the hardest rocks on earth. The taconite is freed from the ground by blasts of carefully placed and timed explosives and then, literally when the dust settles, scooped up by towering, hungry shovels with yawning maws. The shovels in turn pour the taconite into equally massive haul trucks which in a single load can carry as much as 240 tons of ore.

Kids: Don't try this at home.

Courtesy P&H Mine Pro

This is classic hard-rock, big-pit mining. And taconite is one of key T's in northeastern Minnesota's economy (along with Transportation, Timber and Tourism).

An admittedly simplistic explanation of what happens once the truck is loaded:

From the pit, the taconite, which contains about 30 percent iron, is hauled to a huge, thundering plant where it will be crushed into smaller and smaller rock until it is reduced to the consistency of a fine powder. Then the iron will be separated from the rest of the taconite. Next, the iron ore in powder form will be blended with a binding ingredient and formed into pellets, which by this time contain about 65 percent iron.

Taconite pellets: the finished product.

Courtesy P&H Mine Pro

In a process developed half a century ago by University of Minnesota scientist E.W. Davis, the powder will be transformed into hard, marble-like pellets. The pellets will be fired at temperatures higher than 2,000 degrees, which renders them prepared first for transport and then, once delivered to a blast furnace, prime feedstock for the once-again hungry steel mills of North America.

And China. Oh yes, iron mining Minnesota style is part of a global industry, one in which the Port of Duluth-Superior plays a vital role. (More on that in the next edition of North Star Port.)

Minnesota iron mining today has come a long way since the dig-and-damn-the-consequences of its origin. Today, iron mining is sensitive — and responsive — to environmental issues and is a good steward of the land, with comprehensive mineland-reclamation processes.

A haul truck takes on a load at a mine on Minnesota's famed Iron Range.

The mines also have made big strides toward efficiency, with annual improvements in worker-hours per ton of production.

Safety, too, has become a prime concern in the mines and plants, and Minnesota's mines have posted commendable records in the past several years with fewer and fewer reportable, lost-time injuries.

And the pay's good, too. The 3,500 men and women at work at Minnesota's six iron mines make on average $65,000 a year with benefits. Beyond the mines and pellet plants, thousands of more people in hundreds of more businesses support iron mining. Put them all together and iron mining contributes $1.3 billion to the economy in Minnesota and beyond.

Iron mining and steel making have come a long way since Y2K. At the turn of the 21st century, American mining and steel were threatened species, with steel companies going under at frightening pace and Minnesota's mines losing customers just as fast. The early 2000's were noted for production cuts and mine managers nervously monitoring growing piles of pellet inventory.

But iron and steel proved tough and resilient. One company's failure was another company's opportunity. Acquisitions and consolidations followed closings.

Sadly, Minnesota lost LTV Iron Mining, up on the northern edge of the Iron Range. And another mine was shuttered and feared lost. Remarkably, that mine has been reborn. The former EVTAC now is United Taconite — and 30 percent owned by a Chinese company, Laiwu Steel Group. Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. owns the other 70 percent along with all or parts of two other mines. And US Steel's Minntac mine recently fulfilled a contract to supply a Chinese steelmaker with Minnesota pellets. Remarkably, some Iron Range pellets even left Minnesota for China via vessel [North Star Port, Fall 2004].

As further proof of northeastern Minnesota's global mining connections, consider that Cliffs, based in Cleveland, Ohio, and also active in Canada, is acquiring iron mining interests in Australia.

As a result of the realignment of steel in the past few years, and the enormous new demand for ore and other resources in China and other Asian markets — and worldwide iron ore price increases like the 9 percent raise in 2003 and a 19 percent hike in 2004 — today America's leading steel companies once again are profitable, as are the world's.

Everyone in the industry professes to know that "mining is cyclical" — the words are a mantra here — but for now, the industry is riding high on the top of the cycle. Minnesota's iron mines are investing millions of dollars in capital improvements, and many are running at beyond their design capacity. Two lovely words sum up the mode of the moment: "flat out."

And in the future?

Perhaps a plant capable of producing an enhanced nugget of 97 percent iron. A pilot plant at Northshore Mining has shown great potential.

And perhaps an operation on the site of a long-gone mine near Nashwauk that not only would produce direct-reduced iron but also would make steel at the same site.

As we said at the top: Minnesota's Iron Range believes in mining in a big way.

Information for this article was gathered from several sources, including the Iron Mining Association of Minnesota and Skillings Mining Review, Duluth.