User:TS at Doe Run/The Doe Run Company

The Doe Run Resources Corporation (registered to do business as The Doe Run Company) is a privately held natural resources company and global producer of lead, copper, and zinc concentrates. It owns four mills, six mines and a lead battery recycling plant, all in southeast Missouri, United States, and a subsidiary Fabricated Products Inc., with locations in Arizona and Washington. It also owns two former primary lead smelter sites in the U.S. that are currently being remediated. It is wholly owned by The Renco Group, Inc.

History
The St. Joseph Lead Company was founded in New York in 1864. The company operated in the "Old Lead Belt" of Southeast Missouri where it was the dominant mining group. In 1887, the company purchased land to build a smelter in Herculaneum, Missouri. The lead processing smelter was built on 540 acres by the Mississippi River and began operations in 1892. The smelter's establishment was a boon for the town of Herculaneum.

During its early history, St. Joseph Lead Company developed many tools, techniques, and safety processes that became widely adopted by the mining industry. Notable accomplishments included the roof bolt in the 1920s, and the St. Joe Shovel in 1922, which replaced hand shovels and increased daily employee productivity from 21 tons of rock to nearly 300 tons. St. Joe was also the first mining company to employ a dedicated researcher, starting in 1930, which expanded into a department.

In 1955, St. Joe researchers discovered the Viburnum Trend, an area of major mineral deposits. The company built six mines and four mills along the trend. Other companies also developed the area, but Doe Run owned all the mines and mills in the district by 1992.

The company changed its name to St. Joe Minerals in 1970, and was acquired by the Fluor Corporation in 1981. In 1986, St. Joe and another mining company, Homestake Lead, formed a partnership called The Doe Run Company Partnership, which brought Homestake's Buick mine, mill and smelter into St. Joe's operations. The Buick smelter was later converted to the Buick Resource Recycling Division for lead recycling in 1991.

The Renco Group, Inc., acquired The Doe Run Company from Fluor and renamed the company The Doe Run Resources Corporation, registered to do business as The Doe Run Company, in 1994. In 1996, Doe Run established Fabricated Products, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary, and acquired lead fabricating facilities. The following year, Doe Run more than doubled in size with the purchase of the La Oroya smelter and Cobriza copper mine in Peru from Centromin. It also took over the environmental program in place to improve environmental conditions, which had never been addressed by previous owners. Doe Run invested more than $100 million in improvements to reach a goal to reduce emissions within a decade. The company received an extension from the government in 2006, and in February 2007, Doe Run Peru became a separate company from Doe Run.

In the U.S., in 2001, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources found that street dust in the town of Herculaneum contained 30% lead. Testing the same year by the United States Environmental Protection Agency found high levels of air pollution. Test results also showed elevated levels of lead among more than half of pre-school age children who were tested living near the smelter in Herculaneum.

In 2002, Doe Run undertook a voluntary buyout of homes in the area and over the next few years purchased approximately 160 homes. In addition to the buyout, Doe Run invested $14 million in the removal of lead-contaminated soil. It replaced soil for more than 700 properties, including residences, schools, public parks, and other land. By the end of the year, Doe Run was in compliance with the Clean Air Act lead standard. According to a company representative, another $12 million was spent in 2007 in an effort to further reduce air pollution from the smelter.

In 2008, the EPA released a new national lead level standard of 0.15 micrograms lead per cubic meter of air. The new air quality measure was ten times more restrictive than the previous standard of 1.5 micrograms lead per cubic meter. Doe Run agreed to close the Herculaneum smelter and pay $65 million to correct past violations of the federal Clean Air and Clean Water acts.

In 2010, the company announced plans to replace the Herculaneum smelter with an electrowinning plant, which would replace smelting with a contained wet chemical process, reducing emissions by nearly 99 percent. The plans were a result of research the company had been conducting for decades to find a new way to produce lead. Doe Run invested $30 million in developing new technology until the plan was put on hold in 2012.

In December 2013, Doe Run closed the Herculaneum smelter, though refining operations of specialty alloys continue. The company allocated more than $8 million for cleanup of the property following its closure.

After the closure of the Herculaneum primary lead smelting facility in 2013, the company altered its business model to focus on its mining and recycling operations. In 2014, Doe Run celebrated its 150th anniversary.

Citing falling prices and environmental regulations, Doe Run downsized its lead production by approximately 10 percent and eliminated 75 jobs in its Missouri facilities in 2016. In 2016, the company sold 18 acres of its former lead smelter site in Herculaneum to Riverview Commerce Park LLC for redevelopment as a commercial port. Doe Run began demolition on the five main buildings of the Herculaneum smelter in 2017 as part of its redevelopment announced in 2012.

Overview
The Doe Run Company manages various parts of the lead lifecycle, including mining, milling, fabrication, and recycling, and provides lead metals, alloys and lead concentrates to companies globally. The company's headquarters are in St. Louis, Missouri, and Doe Run has holdings in Missouri, Washington and Arizona. Jerry Pyatt has been president and CEO of The Doe Run Company since 2012.

Doe Run is a major employer and contributor to the communities it operates in. The company employs approximately 1,100 people, and it invests in locals schools and infrastructure both financially and through employee community service.

Holdings and products
In the Southeast Missouri Lead District, Doe Run's mines are all on the Viburnum Trend, a 64 km long mineralized shoot with an average width of 150 meters, thickness of 3 to 30 meters and average depth of 300 meters. It is a classic Mississippi Valley type lead/zinc deposit in Cambrian carbonate rocks though it contains an unusually high proportion of lead. The principal minerals are galena (lead, PbS) and sphalerite (zinc, ZnS) with lesser amounts of chalcopyrite (copper, CuFeS2).

The Viburnum Trend is the second largest lead mining district in the world. Predecessors to Doe Run began exploring the area in 1955 and began mining in the 1960s. Doe Run owns six mines there: Brushy Creek, Buick, Casteel, Fletcher/West Fork, Sweetwater and Mine No 29. These mines produce ore that is milled at the company's four mills to extract lead, zinc, and copper concentrates. Approximately 90 percent of the primary lead supply in the United States has been derived from the ore from these mines over the years. Lead concentrates from the area contain more than 75 percent lead, versus an industry average of 45 to 50 percent lead. Following the closure of the Herculaneum smelter, metal concentrates from the mines are shipped overseas for smelting.

Doe Run's other Missouri holdings include a recycling smelter in Boss, Missouri. The secondary smelter recycles metal from old lead batteries and scrap lead. The process creates secondary lead that can be manufactured into new products.

The smelter processes about 13.5 million lead-acid batteries annually, recovering lead from the batteries for reuse. Doe Run is one of only a few North American facilities capable of removing lead from glass in cathode ray tubes that were once common in televisions and computer monitors.

In addition to mining operations and its secondary smelter, The Doe Run Company has a wholly owned subsidiary called Fabricated Products, Inc., that has locations in Vancouver, Washington and Casa Grande, Arizona. These facilities manufacture and market fabricated metal products, including lead oxide for batteries, lead shielding used for radiation protection in hospitals, extruded shapes used in plating and pollution control, lead-lined drywall and plywood, and sheet lead for roof flashing.

Environment, health and safety
Between 2010 and 2015, Doe Run spent $289 million on environmental expenditures in Herculaneum and around the mining and mill sites in the Viburnum Trend. The funds have been used in part for remediating old mining sites and for the construction of water treatment facilities. Environmental safety precautions implemented by Doe Run include washing trucks that may have come into contact with lead. In addition, exposed lead workers at the company's secondary smelter shower and change their clothing at the end of each shift to avoid the spread of lead outside of work.