Kamoa's throughput to increase by a fifth

摘要

Partners Ivanhoe and Zijin say their Kamoa Copper joint venture has approved a debottlenecking plan for Kamoa-Kakula copper mine in the DRC to raise design processing capacity by 21.1 to 9.2 Mt/y from 7.6 Mt/y at steady-state production. The initiative is expected to increase output to more than 450,000 t/y by Q2 next year, making Kamoa-Kakula the world's fourth largest copper producer, according to Ivanhoe Mines of Canada. The debottlenecking project is expected to cost approximately US$50 M (€43.8 M) and take around 12 months to complete. Construction of Kamoa-Kakula's 3.8 Mt/y Phase 2 concentrator is almost complete with early-stage commissioning activities underway. Hot commissioning with first ore and concentrate production are both on track for April, according to Ivanhoe.