Chemours will add a sodium cyanide facility

Chemours is building a $150 million sodium cyanide plant in the Mexican state of Durango. The firm has produced the chemical, used to refine gold, since 1952 at a Memphis facility said to supply one-quarter of the world’s solid sodium cyanide. Although Chem­ours is not disclosing the size of the Mexican facility, the firm earlier said it plans to increase its mining chemicals capacity by 50%. Chem­ours says it chose the Durango location to be near the Mexican precious metals mining industry. In January, a joint venture of Evonik Industries and Grupo Idesa opened a cyanide plant in Coatzacoalcos, Mexico.