Konkola Copper Mines is to construct a new smelter to produce 250
000 t of copper at its Nchanga openpit mine, GM Maxwell Mutale has
disclosed.
He told Mining Weekstandard verses short head crushersly in a recent interview that the smelter is
being built in nickel laterite ore processing plantorder to do away with the need to transport
concentrates to thcrusher ballast convey designe company’s only smelter at Nkana, which is the
largest in Africa – it produces about 150 000 t of copper a
year.
The environmental-impact assessment for the smelter is currently
under way and construction will start as soon as the Environmental
Council of Zambia has approved the project.
Mutale said the smelter would treat concentrates from Konkola mine,
which produces about 2.4-million tons of ore.
The Nchanga openpit mine is among the world’s largest openpit mines
and has an ore-mining capacity of 20 000 t/d.
In a media statement, KCM’s vice-president for corporate relations,
Augustine Seyuba, said that, on completion of the smelter, the
company will have the capability within Zambia to treat all the
copper concentrate that will be produced by other sandstone copper
mines.
He said this would enable Zambia to export value-added finished
copper rather than exporting concentrate.