Collahuasi to start prefeasibility on expansion to 1Mt/y

The Doña Inés de Collahuasi mine in northern Chile's region I is ready to start a prefeasibility study for another expansion project aimed at boosting output to more than 1Mt/y of fine copper, London-based Anglo American's (LSE: AAL) copper business unit CEO John MacKenzie told BNamericas. "We have completed the scoping study on the phase 3 expansion and we have two options for the project. One involves adding a fourth crushing line and the second would add a fourth and a fifth crushing line," MacKenzie said on the sidelines of CRU's 10th World Copper Conference in Santiago. "We will evaluate both options at the same time during works related to the prefeasibility study," he added. Each crushing line would add close to 110,000t/d of ore to throughput, he said. One additional line would increase output to close to 800,000t/y of fine copper, while the second option would reach an output capacity of more than 1Mt/y. Of the 1Mt/y output, 800,000-900,000t/y would be copper in concentrates, with another 200,000t/y in copper cathodes. "If we decide to just develop the first option it will be to speed up the expansion project and we will leave the second option for later," MacKenzie said. "Completion of the full expansion project is targeted for 2017," he added. Water for the project will have to come from new sources, for which the company is already evaluating using seawater. "Both desalinated and direct seawater are options right now," MacKenzie said. The company recently approved development of the second stage in the ongoing debottlenecking project, which aims to reach a throughput capacity of 160,000-170,000t/d, MacKenzie said. The initiative will come on stream in 2013 for a total output of 600,000t/y of fine copper. The first phase is on schedule to be completed in July or August, increasing throughput from the current 140,000t/d to 150,000t/d, according to the CEO. The two phases require a total investment of US$750mn, of which US$92mn was spent last year on the development of phase I. Last year, Collahuasi turned out 504,000t of copper, down from the 535,000t/y produced in 2009. Anglo American owns a 44% stake at Collahuasi. Another 44% stake is controlled by Swiss-based resources group Xstrata (LSE: XTA) while the remainder belongs to a group of Japanese companies led by Mitsui.