Mitsubishi Materials Group’s Tsukuba and Onahama Recover Fully

Mitsubishi Materials continues full capacity production of cemented carbide tools at Tsukuba plant in Ibaraki, Japan since June 2011 although the plant was damaged by the Japan Earthquake. Presently Mitsubishi Materials is constructing a new building inside Tsukuba plant to meet the strong demand. The new facilities will enter full operation within this year. Meanwhile, the copper smelting affiliate, Onahama Smelting & Refining in Fukushima, Japan, entered full operation in September. The smelter was downed by the Japan Earthquake and recommenced in July.

Tsukuba plant is the main manufacturing site of cemented carbide inserts. The plant and facilities were damaged by the Earthquake and the operation suspended. The facilities were completely recovered in May and returned to 24-hour full operation in and after June.

At present, a new building is under construction on the site in order to expand the output capacity by 30% from fiscal 2010 ended March 2011. The construction of new production line is expected to complete in October and enter full operation in December together with the existing lines. There is much demand for inserts from automobile industry.

Onahama Smelting & Refining restarted operation on July 1 at operating rate as low as 65%. The operating rate gradually improved and reached 90% in late August. On and after September 1, the operating rate recovered to 100%. Port facilities are also restored. Copper concentrate will arrive from Similco copper mine in Canada at 12,000 tonnes on September 18. The smelter restarted copper scrap procurement, too.

Mitsubishi Materials’ wholly owned copper smelter in Kagawa, Japan, Naoshima Smelter & Refinery is also in full production. However, Mitsubishi Materials’ electrolytic copper production is estimated to decrease by 22% to 128,376 tonnes for April-September 2011 from the same period of 2010 due to output suspention of Onahama smelter after the quake.