“We’re working hand in glove with the city and with Algoma.”

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http://www.saultstar.com/2018/01/09/website-to-be-used-as-an-initial-communication-tool

Sault Ste. Marie Economic Development Corp. logo.

Want to know more about the Sault’s bid for a ferrochrome processing facility?

Check out the Sault Ste. Marie Economic Development Corp. new website www.SaultFPFproject.com.

Launched Monday, the website will be used to keep the community informed about the initiative. It includes frequently asked questions, a timeline for the project and will be updated regularly, said Dan Hollingsworth, the EDC’s executive director of business development.

To date, Sault Ste. Marie is the first out of the gate of the four competing Northern Ontario cities to launch a website on the project geared towards community engagement.

The website includes basic information about the proposed project, the preferred site and a projected timeline on the project.

It also allows users to ask a question or provide comment.

Hollingsworth said the site will be updated regularly as the bid application is developed. It’s due to Noront Resources on Feb. 2.

“We’re committed to releasing as many details as possible as our team works its way through the proposal process,” he said.

He hopes to update the website weekly as the submission for the bid process enters its last month.

“We have had people calling us asking what’s going on so we felt having the website available to post updates and any information that we do have, with some FAQ that we do have is a way to engage the public,” Hollingsworth said.

The public’s ideas and feedback are welcome on the site. Businesses or organizations are invited to pen a letter of support to be included with the bid submission.

Hollingsworth said the bid package is extensive. While some information is easy to pull together because it includes information on the community itself, there are also about 60 specific questions that delve into aspects about the proposed property site, plant size and practical issues like water, power, sewer and rail and road connectivity. It also requests a detailed cost and freight analysis, among other things.

“We’re making really good progress on it,” Hollingsworth said in a telephone interview with The Sault Star. “We’re working hand in glove with the city and with Algoma.”

The bid team includes working on the project includes Hollingsworth, city CAO Al Horsman and deputy CAO of community development and enterprise Tom Vair and EDC’s manager of trade investment and community marketing Nevin Buconjic.

Hollingsworth said the entire submitted proposal will not be posted on the website because it will include detailed the city’s detailed competitive information that the committee does not want in the public realm.

“We can’t put the entire bid out there in the public because that would give Sault Ste. Marie’s competitive position up,” he said. “A lot of the information is proprietary to what we feel our competitive advantage is.”

Hollingsworth said getting through the bid process, researching the information and analyzing it is critical and much of that is what Sault Ste. Marie will be competing against with other cities like Sudbury, Timmins and Fort William First Nations.

It’s anticipated that once a site is selected – and Sault Ste. Marie is the chosen city – then the website will be expanded as one of the community engagement sites for the city.

More community engagement will be conducted if the city is the chosen site, as part of the anticipated extensive Environmental Assessment process that will need to follow before any plant is ever constructed.

“By no means is this the whole answer or the whole solution to the community engagement. This is just the first step in the process,” he said.

Hollingsworth said the committee has conducted outreach with various community groups and organizations but the focus is now on getting the submission finalized.

“This is the economic development phase. It’s collecting the information, analyzing it and putting our best foot forward,” he said.

Noront Resources Ltd., a Canadian based mining firm, says it plans on building a ferrochrome processing facility in Northern Ontario to process the metals from the Ring of Fire. The company has the largest land position in the Ring of Fire.

A ferrochrome plant ultimately prepares and transforms the chromite ore deposits to ferrochrome, the product used to create stainless steel.

Ferrochrome is created with iron, chrome and oxygen. The high grade chromite ore taken from the Ring of Fire area is ground and put through a processing plant that requires high levels of energy to melt the ore and add carbon to separate the oxygen from the iron and chrome. The completed iron and chrome project is called ferrochrome.

It’s expected the plant would require 100 to 130 mW of power to operate. Any lands would need to be properly designated for heavy industrial use and an array of other planning and environmental requirements would also need to be met.

The final product would be exported to the industrial regions in the northeast United States, such as Ohio and Pennsylvania, to make stainless steel.

The first of its kind ferrochrome plant in North America is estimated at $1 billion. It will employ between 300 and 500 people directly and create more than 1,000 indirect jobs through suppliers and other businesses.