The supply of copper will be rather limited in the future, and future copper production will be dominated by these three mines.
Challenges for the future copper supply
Last year, the senior research analyst at S&P Global Market Finance and Intelligence released a report that says that over the past decade, mining companies have invested a total of $ 26,6 billion, discovering 29 new copper mines, and 140 million tons Copper have been carefully examined. USD 190 / tonne, 13 times more than the past 18 years. In the three years from 2013 to 2016 in particular, only nine new copper mines were discovered. It takes at least 20 years before copper mines can be put into production. This cycle means that the supply of copper ore will be very worrying over the next 15-20 years and the price of copper ore will rise. That's why the Copper ore processing gain more and more importance.
On the demand side, Rio Tinto CEO Jean-Sebastien said Resolution Copper is "one of the most important undeveloped copper mines in the world". The increase in electric vehicles, the high demand for battery storage, the development of new transmission technologies and the demand for other environmentally friendly energy sources will all contribute to a significant increase in copper demand. For example, electric vehicles use twice as much copper as internal combustion engines.
New advances have been made in exploring three world-class copper mines
Due to the current high demand and the low production of global copper mine resources, the world copper price may continue to rise in the next few years and copper companies will benefit from the increased production. Untapped new mines around the world will become the focus of competition and attention from global mining companies.
These three world-class mines have each made new exploration advances and could become the main global force in the future.
Ecuador: Cascaville copper-gold mine
The Cascaville copper-gold mine is located in the Andes Copper Belt, the largest and richest copper producing area in the world. In July 2017, SolGold announced that the mine is located in Casca, 180 kilometers north of Quito, the capital of Ecuador. The high grade mineralization was discovered during drilling at the Weir copper-gold mine, which has become one of the most important achievements in the history of copper-gold mine exploration in the world. The project has been compared by Sol Gold to Rio Tinto's world-class copper-gold mine in Oyu Tolgoi, Mongolia.
The company previously said that drilling on the Cascaville copper-gold project has discovered previously unknown mineralization, further increasing the size of one of the largest copper mines in the world that has been discovered in recent years. The copper equivalent of the project is over 1,5%. The company also found mineralization in the derived Alpala resource area as well as some moderate grade mineralization. The level of mineralization is between 0,7% copper equivalent and 1,5% high grade threshold.
In April 2019, SolGold uncovered mineralization from drilling at the Cascabel copper-gold mine in northern Ecuador that had not previously been noticed. The newly discovered rich mineralized copper equivalent content exceeds 1,5%.
Last November, Sol Gold updated Alpara's resources. The ore resource was 2,95 billion tons, the copper equivalent was 0,52%, that is 10,9 million tons of copper and 23,2 million ounces of gold. The company has drilled 56.400 meters since November.
Mongolia: Hammagot Thai copper and gold project
Hammagot is located in the East Gobi province, about 420 kilometers from Ulaanbaatar and 120 kilometers north of the huge copper-gold deposit Oyu Tolgoi.
In the middle of the past 15 years, XANADU Mines announced that it had discovered massive sulfidic mineralized breccias in its drill holes at the Kharmagtai copper-gold project. The mineralized breccia diamond drilling produced 50 meters at a depth of 374 meters, with a copper content of 1,8% and a gold content of 0,7 g / ton, of which 27 meters at a depth of 384 meters, a copper content of 2,5 % and a gold content of 0,9 g / ton were found.
The massive sulphide mineralization of the Hamagothai copper-gold mine is accompanied by a wider range of porphyry mineralization: a depth of 88 meters of copper was discovered, the copper content was 412,5% and the gold content was 0,6 , 0,2 g / ton. 342 meters of ore were found at a depth of 243,8 meters, the copper content was 0,8% and the gold content was 0,3 g / ton.
At the end of last year, XanaduMines announced that its open-pit resources in the Kharmagtai project in the Mongolian province of South Gobi had increased significantly.
According to the 0,3% copper limit, the open pit ore resource of this project is 598 million tonnes and the amount of copper metal is 1,9 million tonnes, an increase of 400% over the amount of resources reported in 2015; the gold grade is 4,3 million ounces, an increase of 249%.
The amount of high grade copper ore in the flat part is 54 million tons and the copper equivalent grade is 0,86%, of which 61% is the estimated amount of resources.
Estimated resources include White Hill, Stockwork Hill, and Copper Hill, excluding the newly discovered Zarra deposit.
In the next resource update, Sanadou will include the expansion of the Baishan opencast mine, the newly discovered Zara deposit and the two deposits Zephyr and Sandstorm with very good prospects. The company will upgrade the estimated amount of resources to the expected level of the estimated amount of resources.
China's Duolong mine
The Duolong deposit is located in Wuma Township, Gaize County, Ali District, Tibet. There are several deposits from the southwest to the northeast such as the bunkers Namugang, Nadun, Polong, Duobuza, Rongna and Naruo. It is the largest copper deposit in China and has become the most potential development base for copper mine reserves in China.
In December 2016, the Rongna ore intercepts of the Duolong Mine Area and the Naruo Mine Area totaled 13,492 million tons of copper metal, making the Dulong Mine Area the first world-class super copper mine area in China.
According to Wang Dongsheng, general manager of Chinalco Mineral Resources Co., Ltd. In the Dulong mine concentration area, the Tibet Geological Team No. 5 held a total of 12 mining rights. In addition to the 9 exploration rights in collaboration with Chinalco, the other 3 collaborated with Sichuan Hongda. The two exploration rights in the Polong and Bolong concessions have also discovered more than 7 million tons of copper metal. This means that the total amount of copper metal in the Duolong mine area has exceeded 20 million tons.
Regardless of whether it is an ore field or an ore cluster area, there are only 24 significant super copper mines with reserves of over 20 million tons of copper worldwide. Although the Duolong mine area has only explored in 4 of them, the amount of copper metal found has exceeded 20 million tons, making it the 25th member of an important super copper mining area. As long as the exploration of the deep sides of the ore body and other exploration rights areas continues, the rank of the Dulong Mine Cluster in major super copper mines will continue to increase.
Text and images: Linda Zhou
ISE in Romanian
