Compass Minerals International, Inc is a

public company A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange ( ...

that, through its subsidiaries, is a leading producer of minerals, including salt,

magnesium chloride Magnesium chloride is the family of inorganic compounds with the formula , where x can range from 0 to 12. These salts are colorless or white solids that are highly soluble in water. These compounds and their solutions, both of which occur in natu ...

sulfate of potash Potassium sulfate (US) or potassium sulphate (UK), also called sulphate of potash (SOP), arcanite, or archaically potash of sulfur, is the inorganic compound with formula K2SO4, a white water-soluble solid. It is commonly used in fertilizers, prov ...

and other plant nutrition products. Based in

Overland Park, Kansas Overland Park ( ) is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of Kansas. Located in Johnson County, Kansas, it is one of four principal cities in the Kansas City metropolitan area and the most populous suburb of Kansas City, Missouri. As ...

; the company provides bulk treated and untreated highway deicing salt to customers in North America and the United Kingdom and plant nutrition products to growers worldwide. Compass Minerals also produces consumer de-icing and water conditioning products, consumer and commercial culinary salt, and other mineral-based products for consumer, agricultural, and industrial applications. In addition, Compass Minerals provides records management services to businesses throughout the United Kingdom.

Ranks

Compass Minerals is the biggest: *Salt producer in North America and the United Kingdom *Sulfate of potash specialty fertilizer producer in the Western Hemisphere *Magnesium chloride deicing/de-dusting producer in North America In 2012, Compass Minerals had total sales of $942 million and ended the year with

market capitalization Market capitalization, sometimes referred to as market cap, is the total value of a publicly traded company's outstanding common shares owned by stockholders. Market capitalization is equal to the market price per common share multiplied by ...

of just $2.5 billion. The company is part of the S&P MidCap 400 Index, the

Russell 1000 The Russell 1000 Index is a stock market index that tracks the highest-ranking 1,000 stocks in the Russell 3000 Index, which represent about 93% of the total market capitalization of that index. , the stocks of the Russell 1000 Index had a weig ...

Index and was included in ''Fortune'' magazine’s 2010 listing of the “100 Fastest-Growing Companies.” Though the company’s history stretches back as far as 1844, Compass Minerals became a public company following its

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investme ...

in December 2003.Company website

Production methods and facilities

Underground salt mining

Underground salt mining produces rock salt using both drill-and-blast and

continuous mining Room and pillar or pillar and stall is a variant of breast stoping. It is a mining system in which the mined material is extracted across a horizontal plane, creating horizontal arrays of rooms and pillars. To do this, "rooms" of ore are dug out wh ...

techniques in deep deposits. Compass Minerals is the largest rock salt producer in North America and the U.K. It operates underground salt mines at

Goderich, Ontario Goderich ( or ) is a town in the Canadian province of Ontario and is the county seat of Huron County. The town was founded by John Galt and William "Tiger" Dunlop of the Canada Company in 1827. First laid out in 1828, the town is named af ...

, the largest salt mine in the world with an annual capacity of 9 million tons; Cote Blanche, Louisiana, with annual capacity of 3.4 million tons; and Winsford, Cheshire, United Kingdom, with annual capacity of 1.5 million tons.

Mechanical evaporation

Mechanical evaporation uses high-efficiency vacuum processes to produce high-purity, fine- and coarse-grained salt products for commercial, agricultural, and industrial applications. Compass Minerals is a leading producer of mechanically evaporated salt in North America. It operates mechanical evaporation salt facilities in Lyons, Kansas (annual capacity 450,000 tons),

Unity, Saskatchewan Unity is a town in the western part of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan with a population of 2573. Unity is located at the intersection of Highway 14 and Highway 21, and the intersection of the CNR and CPR main rail lines. Unity is locate ...

(160,000 tons);

(130,000 tons); and

Amherst, Nova Scotia Amherst ( ) is a town in northwestern Nova Scotia, Canada, located at the northeast end of the Cumberland Basin, an arm of the Bay of Fundy, and south of the Northumberland Strait. The town sits on a height of land at the eastern boundary of th ...

(130,000 tons). Compass Minerals also operates an SOP evaporation facility at Wynyard, Saskatchewan, with annual capacity of 40,000 tons. (Source: Compass Minerals 2012 Annual Report)

Solar evaporation

Solar evaporation is the oldest and most energy-efficient method of mineral production. At the Great Salt Lake near

Ogden, Utah Ogden is a city in and the county seat of Weber County, Utah, United States, approximately east of the Great Salt Lake and north of Salt Lake City. The population was 87,321 in 2020, according to the US Census Bureau, making it Utah's eighth ...

, Compass Minerals draws naturally occurring brine out of the lake into shallow ponds and allows solar evaporation to produce salt,

(SOP) and

. Its SOP plant at the

Great Salt Lake The Great Salt Lake is the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphere and the eighth-largest terminal lake in the world. It lies in the northern part of the U.S. state of Utah and has a substantial impact upon the local climate, particu ...

is the largest in North America and one of only three SOP brine solar evaporation operations in the world. Annual capacity is 350,000 tons of SOP, 1.5 million tons of salt, and 750,000 tons of magnesium chloride. (Source: Compass Minerals 2012 Annual Report)

Business segments

Compass Minerals operates two business segments, Salt and Plant Nutrition. Compass Minerals’ Salt Segment mines, produces, processes and distributes sodium chloride and magnesium chloride in North America and the U.K. The segment’s largest business is highway deicing, which primarily sells bulk rock salt to states, provinces, counties, municipalities and road maintenance contractors for ice control on public roadways. The highway deicing product line also includes flake and liquid magnesium chloride used for deicing and dust control; treated rock salt treated for deicing in very low temperatures; and rock salt for the chlor-alkali industry. The salt segment also includes consumer and industrial product lines, which includes pure sodium chloride and blended products containing magnesium chloride, calcium chloride and potassium chloride for applications such as consumer and professional deicing, water conditioning, culinary salt, animal nutrition, swimming pool minerals, and industrial applications. Compass Minerals’ Plant Nutrition Segment produces sulfate of potash fertilizer. Compass Minerals also manufactures micronutrient and secondary plant nutrition products under the Wolf Trax brand. Wolf Trax products include DDP Nutrients and PROTINUS Seed Nutrition. Compass Minerals’ domestic sales of SOP are concentrated in the Western and Southeastern U.S. and exports to Latin America, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand.

References

{{Authority control Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange Mining companies of the United States Non-renewable resource companies established in 2001 Companies based in Overland Park, Kansas 2001 establishments in Kansas