#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. Despite the difficult year, Nornickel today remains in the top 5 investment-attractive companies thanks to its investment program. Nikolay Utkin, Nornickel’s senior vice president, the Norilsk Division’s head, spoke about this in an interview with the Klyuch – Severny Gorod TV channel.
“In 2023, we did not cut anything, moreover, we increased our investment power, projects started and ongoing. In 2023, the investment amounted to over 450 billion rubles. First of all, the Sulfur Program is our flagship, thanks to which we took first place this year as an attractive company in terms of ESG and ecology in the Technology of the Future category. This is very important for the company.
Of course, an important component is the accompanying infrastructure projects, this is a new deposit, the Mokulaevsky open-pit mine, where the company has invested over 22 billion rubles. In the Sulfur Program, if we return only to the first line, capital investments amounted to over 180 billion rubles”, said Nikolay Utkin.
A very important area is ore processing. This is the Talnah factory, the third complex along with a new tailings dump, the second field, where investments have already amounted to almost 40 billion rubles.
“Let’s not forget about the great activity and our investments in social development, renovation of Norilsk, the city infrastructure projects, where over 200 billion rubles were also invested”, added the head of the company’s Norilsk Division.
A comprehensive testing of the Sulfur Program, which was launched in October, is currently underway. This is the development of technologies, technological, design solutions that were laid down.
“Today we already obtain acid from exhaust gases and reduce the burden on our environment. And of course, it is important to reach project targets by the end of the year. We can do it. Already in 2024, the first line will reduce the burden on the city environment, recycle over 440 thousand tons of SO2. This is more than a quarter of all emissions at Nadezhda metallurgical plant alone. The second and third lines will provide over 900 thousand tons of sulfur dioxide utilization per year. On the scale of the federal Clean Air project, which includes our Sulfur Program, this will be the disposal of over a quarter of sulfur dioxide emissions throughout the country”, added Nikolay Utkin.
The company is implementing another environmental project as well – Clean Norilsk. In two years, 330 buildings were dismantled, three million square meters of territory were cleared, and 80 hectares of this land were reclaimed. In 2023, the company began providing this service to the city.
Nikolay Utkin also spoke about new initiatives of the Norilsk Division:
“The first methane filling station has appeared in Norilsk, and the first KamAZ trucks are already undergoing testing. That is, we are also gasifying our transport component here. And this is a very important direction of the ESG agenda in the environmental aspect”.
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