Most of the smelting furnaces in China's largest tin producing area shut down

Affected by the new round of environmental protection inspections, most of the fuming furnaces in the tin smelters in Gejiu, Yunnan, have been shut down at the end of March.

The fuming furnace is used to process low-grade raw materials such as tin ore, tin-containing slag, and hard ends, and the produced smoke dust is processed into particles, which is an important raw material for electric furnace smelting. The shutdown of the fuming furnace has resulted in a shortage of raw materials for electric furnace smelting.

In addition, the recent outbreak of a local epidemic in Ruili, the city has been closed since March 31, and all ports have been closed, further affecting the supply of imported tin ore. Ruili port imports about 500-600 tons of tin concentrate every month. Affected by the continued shortage of raw materials, the smelting and processing fees are at a low level. The current 40-degree tin concentrate processing fees in Yunnan are around 12,500 yuan/ton.

Local people expect that the environmental protection inspection team will be stationed in Honghe Prefecture, Yunnan in early April, and the inspection time will be about one month. Subsequent small and medium smelters in Gejiu area may also suspend production of some rough smelting and refining equipment. Based on the 10-day suspension of production, it is estimated that the output of refined tin will be affected by about 1,200 tons.

In addition, due to equipment maintenance needs or insufficient supply of raw materials, some smelters in Guangxi, Anhui, and Inner Mongolia have started to stop production and overhaul from mid-to-late March. Calculated by the suspension of production for half a month, the affected refined tin output in these three regions is about 1000 tons.