Aaron J. Brown

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Minnesota Brown: Modern Life on the Iron Range

  • Essar names buyer for pellets at new taconite plant

    Essar names buyer for pellets at new taconite plant

    Essar Steel Minnesota has announced a purchase agreement with Arcelor Mittal for the taconite pellets it plans to produce early next year. The new Essar plant is now under construction near Nashwauk on Minnesota’s western Mesabi Iron Range. A press release was sent out earlier today, compiled here in the Hibbing Daily Tribune.

    February 11, 2013
  • Essar loan extended, company in talks to bring steel plant to Range

    Essar loan extended, company in talks to bring steel plant to Range

    Essar Steel, an Indian company planning to open a new taconite plant near Nashwauk next year, is talking to another company about bringing an historic steel plant to northern Minnesota’s Iron Range. This according to reports from yesterday’s meeting of the Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation Board in Eveleth. Essar also got their $6.7 million…

    December 14, 2012
  • Essar affirms plans for 2013 Iron Range taconite production

    Essar affirms plans for 2013 Iron Range taconite production

    Essar Steel Minnesota is still eying 2013 taconite production on the Iron Range and will work through the winter on construction of its plant near Nashwauk. I spoke with Essar spokesman Kevin Kangas today after my post last night about the Anacostia and Pacific Railroad’s decision to pursue other options for the engines it had…

    November 13, 2012
  • Iron Range’s Essar project ‘on track’ but needs trains

    Iron Range’s Essar project ‘on track’ but needs trains

    (This post now contains some additions and a correction from Essar, which are indicated in italics below) Someone call Sir Topham Hatt on the Island of Sodor. A new Iron Range mining project is in great need of some “really useful engines.” At a recent meeting of the Itasca County Regional Rail Authority, officials revealed…

    November 12, 2012
  • First mining equipment arrives at Essar’s Nashwauk site

    First mining equipment arrives at Essar’s Nashwauk site

    Since news a couple weeks ago that Essar Steel was slowing construction at its Nashwauk taconite plant site the company has been working hard to convey the notion that the slowdown is only temporary. Today, the company announced that its first piece of mining equipment, the pictured drill, has arrived on site. Essar Steel Minnesota…

    September 28, 2012
  • Essar says construction will continue, taconite plant to open on time

    Essar says construction will continue, taconite plant to open on time

    An Essar Steel official has contacted me to clarify that work at the company’s new taconite plant near Nashwauk has not stopped. About 100 contractors remain on site in some capacity (I hear electricians and excavators), along with about 100 employees working on other aspects of the project. So Essar is not “shutting down” its…

    September 11, 2012
  • Essar unexpectedly slows down new plant construction

    Essar unexpectedly slows down new plant construction

    Essar Steel is slowing construction of its new taconite plant north of Nashwauk on Minnesota’s Iron Range. The India-based global industrial giant announced a two-week shut down related to global steel and taconite prices, according to company spokespeople in local media. Rumors of odd supply chain delays at the site were rampant around the area…

    September 8, 2012
  • Essar "about halfway finished" at Nashwauk plant site

    Essar "about halfway finished" at Nashwauk plant site

    Officials toured the new Essar Steel Minnesota site yesterday with the company’s India-based CEO. Essar says the project is about half complete. We western Iron Rangers have seen the enormous cranes from Highway 169, but the video from the tour shows what they’ve been up to. A whole lot of earth has been moved. Absent…

    August 23, 2012
  • Essar on track for 2013 start on the Range

    The big grinding mills have arrived at Essar Steel Minnesota’s taconite plant north of Nashwauk. The photo here shows one being unloaded at the Port of Duluth Tuesday. These mills are a distinct feature of taconite plants, constantly rotating 24 hours a day crushing rock down to fine powder for concentration into iron-rich taconite pellets.…

    June 20, 2012
  • Essar’s steel arrives in Nashwauk

    Essar’s steel arrives in Nashwauk

    The first steel beams for the Essar Steel Minnesota plant in Nashwauk arrived yesterday. The steel arrived on tractor-trailers from Baltimore, where the 120 metric tons arrived from its point of origin in India. The decision to use Indian steel, part of a financing requirement for the India-based Essar, was controversial here on the Iron…

    November 8, 2011
  • Editorial asks necessary questions on Excelsior’s Range dealings

    Editorial asks necessary questions on Excelsior’s Range dealings

    The Duluth News Tribune ran an pertinent editorial today after its must-read, two–part series investigating Excelsior Energy’s Mesaba Energy Project on the Iron Range. Worth reading entirely, here is the thrust: Questions abound: Why didn’t elected leaders demand more spending scrutiny? Why has Rep. Anzelc been largely alone in waving a red flag? Why did…

    August 23, 2011
  • Essar cites progress, with a twist in Range steel mill hopes

    Essar cites progress, with a twist in Range steel mill hopes

    The Duluth News Tribune reported on the construction status of Essar Steel Minnesota’s new taconite plant in Nashwauk, very near the former location of the old Butler Tac plant. Butler’s closing was perhaps the biggest symbol of the Iron Range’s 1980s collapse. The prospect of reopening a mine there and maybe even making steel on…

    August 2, 2011
  • Minnesota Power to supply energy for Essar

    Minnesota Power to supply energy for Essar

    The Essar Minnesota Steel project near Nashwauk seems to be making slow progress in its construction of a revitalized new taconite mine and still-proposed steel mill. Nevertheless, they are holding press events. Yesterday Essar officials joined officials from Minnesota Power and the Nashwauk Public Utilities Commission to announce that Essar will purchase power from Minnesota…

    July 28, 2011
  • Essar reiterates plans to produce steel on the Range

    Essar reiterates plans to produce steel on the Range

    The Hibbing Daily Tribune reports that the Essar Steel Minnesota project near Nashwauk is making progress (subscription link). This according to statements at a public meeting between local officals and Essar represntatives. The company’s commmunication with the people of the region, who have underwritten much of the infrastructure, has been lacking, however. The meeting was…

    June 17, 2011
  • Essar moves ahead with Nashwauk plans

    Essar moves ahead with Nashwauk plans

    Business North leads today with an update on the Essar Steel project slated over the boneyard of the old Butler mine outside Nashwauk. Company officials explain the progress of what is supposed to become the first integrated mining and steelmaking facility on northern Minnesota’s Iron Range. Others, (including, as I now see, myself), are quoted…

    April 18, 2011
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