Environmental benefits of high-grade Mn ore

With South Africa holding over 80% of the world's high-grade manganese ore reserves, MMC is located in "Manganese Country".

The environmental impact of hazardous residue disposal is much less when using high-grade manganese ore. Using a 47% manganese content ore, MMC disposes 1.65 tons of waste per ton of manganese metal produced.

If for example the ore contained only 15% manganese, then up to 9 tons of waste needs to be disposed for every ton of manganese metal produced.

Continuous pressure by tightening environmental laws caused environmental cost associated with the production of manganese metal to increase significantly over the past few years.

This increase in environmental cost has closed down capacity in France, Japan and the USA, leaving only two producing countries in the world from 2002 onwards - China and South Africa. MMC has already made the substantial environmental investment necessary to ensure its operation for another 40 year.

MMC - Selenium free

Selenium is one of the 12 most hazardous substances as defined by the EPA-TCLP test. Adding selenium to the electrolytic manganese manufacturing process, improves the efficiency with which electricity is utilized to convert manganese in solution to manganese metal. 

Although a possible production cost saving, MMC has decided not to use the selenium technology as the short term cost benefit is far outweighed by the risk of poisoning our and our customer's employees, rivers, skies and farmlands.

There are also additional costs associated with the treatment and disposal facilities necessary to comply with the environmental regulations associated with selenium.