Gypsum industry news

Canada: Georgia-Pacific has idled its Cape Breton gypsum mine in Nova Scotia due to the weak US dollar and low demand for wallboard in the US. The company is laying off 34 workers at the site whilst retaining eight others as a skeleton staff.

Georgia-Pacific told its workers on 2 December 2011 that it will indefinitely idle operations at its Sugar Camp quarry. "This is not a closure or a shutdown; it's an indefinite idle," said company spokesman Eric Abercrombie. "This is purely a business decision to idle the facility based on the North American market conditions and the weaker US dollar."

Georgia-Pacific had 73 employees in Cape Breton until the autumn of 2011. The Sugar Camp operation has been open since 1962. In December 2011 USG permanently closed the Fundy Gypsum mine in Hantsport, Nova Scotia.

Canada: USG has announced that it permanently closing the Fundy Gypsum mine in Hantsport, Nova Scotia. 50 people were working at the mine until it was idled earlier in 2011. The Hantsport mine had been producing gypsum since 1934.

Robert Williams, spokesman for USG, said that the decision to close is a direct result of weak demand for USG's flagship wallboard Sheetrock® in the United States. because of the ongoing housing recession. He said being a stand-alone mine an expensive freighter ride away from USG's four US manufacturing plants also hurt the Hantsport mine's viability. Williams said finding another buyer will be difficult.

"The main use for gypsum is gypsum wallboard,"' he said. "It is unlikely that anyone else would have an appetite for it."

The company once employed hundreds of people and spent US$50m in the 1990s to upgrade the Hantsport operation.

Somaliland: GMT Minerals is looking to develop 'undoubtedly one of the largest' gypsum deposits in the world. Located in Berbera, Somaliland, the deposit is exposed for many miles, and extends for approximately five miles to the south of Berbera. It is between nine to 14 miles of a nearby port. The deposit is known to contain many millions of tons of good grade gypsum and anhydrite. It is thought that there are over 13Mt of greater than 90% pure gypsum and a further 9Mt of greater than 85% pure gypsum.

GMT Minerals is intending to establish a new front-end gypsum processing and handling facility near the deposit. The new front-end gypsum processing facility at Berbera will process about 2Mt/yr of gypsum and produce a homogenised, 50mm product that is suitable for pulverisation and calcination prior to use in board production.