Las Bambas copper mine
Las Bambas copper mine is a large open-pit copper mine in Peru. The polymetallic mine is located at altitude of about 4000 meters above sea level in Challhuahuacho District of Cotabambas Province in the Apurímac Region of the southern Peruvian Andes. With over a billion tons of copper ore, the deposit is one of the largest in the world. With about 140,000 tons of copper ore are mined daily,[1] the estimated mine life of at least 20 years. The mine produces 2% of global copper.[2]
Las Bambas project besides copper concentrates will be also producing molybdenum concentrates, both concentrates will be transported on a bimodal way from Las Bambas mining operations to Puerto Matarani. First overland transport from Las Bambas to a transfer station located in Pillones follow by railways to Matarani Port. Geoservice Ingeniería is in charge of the preparation of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) so that Pillones transfer station can be expanded.[3]
Minerals and Metals Group acquired Las Bambas copper project from Glencore Xstrata plc. for US$5.85 billion. White & Case, advised the Consortium comprised by Minerals and Metals Group (62.5%), a wholly owned subsidiary of Guoxin International Investment Co. Ltd (22.5%) and CITIC Metal Co. Ltd (15.0%).[4]
History
To make way for the mine, the Fuerabamba community was resettled[2] into the city of Nueva Fuerabamba (New Fuerabamba), which was built between 2012 and 2014. Golder Associates made the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) studies back on 2010, since then there have been two amendments to said studies one of them being carried by SNC-Lavalin on 2014, the amendment of EIA included updated project schedule, auxiliary components of the project and the respective water management system.[5]
GyM S.A, the largest construction company in Peru and a subsidiary of the Graña y Montero company, in 2012 was in charge of constructing the copper concentration plant with a capacity of 140,000 t/day.[6]
Production at the mine was scheduled to start in 2015 following an 80% confirmation completion of the project on 31 Dec 2014. The first production of concentrate out of the mine is expected to be in the first quarter of 2016.[7]
See also
- 2015 Peruvian protests against Las Bambas mining project
- List of mines in Peru
- List of open-pit mines
- Zinc mining
References
- ^ Kampagne „Bergwerk Peru – Reichtum geht, Armut bleibt": Kupfer-Abbau in Peru, S. 2, retrieved 13 May 2019.
- ^ a b Marcelo, Rochabrun (27 April 2022). "Exclusive: China-owned Las Bambas mine weighs plan to evict protesting communities". Reuters. Retrieved 27 April 2022.
- ^ "Concentrates transport". Digiscend.com. 2014. Retrieved 2015-02-20.
- ^ "Las Bambas Acquisition". Digiscend.com. 2014. Retrieved 2015-02-09.
- ^ "EIAs". Digiscend.com. 2010. Retrieved 2015-02-09.
- ^ "Copper concentration plant". Digiscend.com. 2012. Retrieved 2015-02-09.
- ^ "Las Bambas starting production". mmg.com/. 2014. Archived from the original on 2015-02-07. Retrieved 2015-02-09.