Close

Vale employee smiling in green landscape. She is wearing a green Vale
uniform, goggles, helmet and ear plugs. Visual wave artifact Vale
Imagem de header interno Imagem de header interno

On Wednesday, December 7, at Vale Day 2022, Vale presented its strategic agenda and business prospects for the coming years. The annual meeting was held in person, bringing together investors and capital market analysts at the New York Stock Exchange.

Our CEO, Eduardo Bartolomeo, gave the opening remarks, presenting advances in our strategic agenda, based on the pillars of risk reduction, the company’s remodeling, improving our market valuation and disciplined capital allocation. Among other things, he highlighted our progress in remediation work in Brumadinho and Mariana, our search for growth opportunities, cost efficiency, and the safety of dams and operations. Bartolomeo also stressed our major contributions to social and economic development and our ambition to be a leader in sustainable mining, focused on reducing CO2 emissions and mitigating climate change. 

We want to decarbonize the world. You see climate change happening now in Brazil, with an increasingly strange climate and heavy rains this year and also in 2020. Climate change is already here and people need to be aware of it, because if nothing is done, everyone will feel the impact and not only in terms of minerals, but in all aspects. That is why we are talking about an energy revolution, and that is why we are not just paying lip service but working to reduce our business’ carbon emissions.”

Eduardo Bartolomeo

CEO 
In addition to Bartolomeo, executive vice presidents Marcello Spinelli (ferrous metals), Deshnee Naidoo (base metals) and Gustavo Pimenta (finance and investor relations) also participated in the event and gave presentations about Vale’s opportunities in terms of energy transition materials, our positioning as a company that offers solutions for the steel industry and the need for operational discipline and cost control.  

See the main points presented at Vale Day 2022:

Our executive vice president for ferrous metals, Marcello Spinelli, spoke about the transformations that have been taking place in the steel market and how we have the solutions to meet new needs. Our commitment to mitigate climate change has accelerated the decarbonization process in the steel sector. Our impact on the market needs to be considered and we have invested in innovation and technology to become a solutions company for the steel industry, seeking increasingly sustainable mining and high-quality production. 

Spinelli emphasized that the use of agglomerated products such as our pellets and green briquettes is essential for us to achieve our commitment to reduce our net Scope 3 emissions by 15% by 2035. This year, we signed three agreements with local authorities and clients to develop “Mega Hubs” in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Oman, where we will concentrate iron ore and produce green briquettes, to be used to make high-quality sponge iron (HBI) and other steel products. These solutions will contribute to a significant reduction in CO2 emissions across the chain and create substantial value for clients, society and shareholders. 

“We know our problems, we are dealing with them and we have a realistic plan to solve them. However, what I would like to highlight is that we are becoming a solutions company for the steel industry.” Marcello Spinelli, executive vice president, ferrous metals 

This was the first time that our executive vice president for base metals, Deshnee Naidoo, took part in this event. She presented an overview of opportunities in the copper and nickel market, driven by decarbonization and the energy transition. She also spoke about our competitive advantages, such as world-class, low-carbon products, strategic commercial agreements with companies such as Tesla, Northvolt and GM, and advances in innovation and technology to improve safety and performance, such as the opening of the Integrated Remote Operations Center (iROC) in Sudbury, Canada. 

She also mentioned other advances in performance and future strategy, including the recent approval of construction plans for the second furnace in Onça Puma, Pará, Brazil, and the progress of the Bahodopi and Pomalaa projects in Indonesia, which will allow our nickel production to grow.  

“This is the right time for nickel and copper and we have a unique business in terms of our resources. We have access to the right geographies, we are leading the low-carbon agenda and we are working on timely measures to stabilize our current operations and grow from them. We also have several unparalleled projects that we are implementing as quickly as possible to get them to our clients, which are very keen to obtain them.” Deshnee Naidoo, executive vice president, base metals 

Naidoo also presented another successful delivery by our company: the project to expand the Salobo operation, Vale’s largest copper operation, in Pará, Brazil. 

We have invested around US$1.1 billion in this initiative, which consisted of implementing a third processing line with a capacity of 12 Mtpa, increasing our copper production by between 30,000 and 40,000 metric tons per year. This world-class project is also in line with our goal of doubling the number of women in our operations by 2025, as more than 40% of the new plant’s workforce are women. 

Salobo III is expected to be operating at full capacity in the fourth quarter of 2024.

Our executive vice president for finance and investor relations, Gustavo Pimenta, started off by talking about base metals, which have been experiencing growing market demand and have the potential to become an important element in the global transition to low-carbon energy.  

At our company, we understand that with the right investments and assets, we have not just a business opportunity, but a societal call to support the energy transition. We have been looking for commercial strategies to harness the potential of this sector and, to this end, we are looking for a minority partner to take a stake of up to 10% in our base metals operations. The objective is to accelerate and solidify this operation, bringing opportunities to the business, but without the intention of selling or merging, since we have the most important ores in the world. 

Furthermore, when analyzing our progress in the Brumadinho remediation work and the creation of social and environmental goals, Pimenta said, “We are very pleased to see our evolution in environmental, social and governance (ESG) evaluations.”  

Downloads and replay

Replay the webcast and download the presentation. 

Watch the videos presented at Vale Day 2022.