SHANGHAI, Aug 16 (SMM) – Primary lead output from Henan shrank this week, as heavy rainfall caused the breakdown of production equipment at a smelter.
An SMM survey showed that the average operating rate across primary lead smelters in Henan slipped 2 percentage points from the previous week to stand at 77.1% in the week ended August 16.
The rate across Henan, Hunan and Yunnan, however, dipped only 0.3 percentage point to 60.4%, as greater output from Yunnan largely offset the losses after a smelter recovered to full capacity.
Operating rate across Yunnan primary lead smelters climbed 3.7 percentage points to 42.8% this week, while that for Hunan remained unchanged at 43.4%.
Smelters such as Inner Mongolia Xing’an Silver & Lead and Yunnan Mengzi will conduct month-long maintenance in September, SMM learned, which is expected to impact output by a combined volume of 15,000 mt.
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