POTASH PRODUCTION – Patience Lake gets boost

SASKATCHEWAN - POTASH CORP. OF SASKATCHEWAN, located in Saskatoon, has announced plans to reopen its Patience Lake potash solution mine. Pending regulatory approval, PCS will spend $92 million to put 360,000 t of previously idled capacity back on stream within 18 months. This year the Patience Lake mine is budgeted to produce 240,000 t of potash.

PCS has plans to increase total production capacity to13.5 million t/y by the end of 2010, compared with 10.0 million t/y in 2006. Besides the work at Patience Lake, the company is debottlenecking operations at the Allan and Lanigan potash mines, adding to its total by 400,000 t/y in 2007 and 1.5 million t/y in 2008.

Debottlenecking and expansion is also planned for the Cory potash mine in Saskatchewan and New Brunswick operations, but those plans have yet to receive approval from the directors of PCS. Additional expansion projects are under consideration for other Saskatchewan operations.

If all the projects underway or on the drawing board are completed, PCS (www.PotashCorp.com) will have an annual production capacity of 15.7 million t potash by 2015.