Vale to expand Brazilian port terminal, install new CEO

Yesterday, Brazilian mining company Vale announced plans to spend $2.9 billion to increase capacity at the Ponta da Madeira Port Terminal (TPPM) in São Luís, Brazil. The expansion blueprint calls for installing a new pier, dredging to increase water depth and double tracking a 71-mile stretch on the company’s Carajás Railroad.

The São Luís facility can become the country’s leading port next year in terms of cargo handling capacity and volume, Vale officials believe. TPPM can handle more iron ore and become an important transport hub for soy and corn via a new route provided by Vale’s North-South Railroad and interconnected with a Carajás Railroad line, company officials said in a prepared statement. The São Luís port would become an alternative to major Brazilian ports in Rio Grande, Paranaguá and Santos, they said.

Vale also announced that Murilo Pinto de Oliveira Ferreira will succeed Roger Agnelli as chief executive officer on May 22, when Agnelli’s term expires. Ferreira has more than 30 years of mining industry experience.

He joined Vale in 1998 as director of Vale do Rio Doce Alumínio-Aluvale and held several senior management positions — including CEO of Vale Inco (currently Vale Canada) and executive director of Nickel and Base Metals Sales of Vale — until he left the company in 2008.