RANKED: Top 10 lowest cost copper mines
The all-in sustaining cost (AISC) metric has been widely used in the mining industry since 2013 for its comprehensive and transparent look at an operation’s costs.
According to data from Miningintelligence, Lundin Mining’s Chapada mine was the clear winner among global copper operations in AISC at $1,411 per tonne during the second quarter of this year.
In second and third place are two mines owned by First Quantum Minerals – Guelb Moghrein in Mauritania and Las Cruces in Spain – with AISC of $1,918/t and $2,050/t respectively, while the Vancouver company’s Zambian operation also cracks the top 10.
The fourth place is shared by the Antas mine in Brazil owned by Oz Minerals and Atico Mining’s El Roble mine in Colombia, both operating at all in costs below $3,000/t during Q2 2020.
A majority of copper operations in the top 10 use truck & shovel technology, with the exception of El Roble (drift & fill, cut & fill), Carrapateena (sublevel caving), Jabal Sayid (long hole stoping) and Cozamin (long hole stoping, cut & fill).
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2 Comments
Night Rider
Come on, not-so-mining editors, long HOLE stoping!
Copper Bull
Why did you show tonnes of milled ore when you obviously calculated costs per final product (copper). Plus, you shouldn’t compare mines where costs do include significant amount (more than 50%) of by-products (Chapada, Guelb, etc.) to pure copper mines (Jabal Sayid, Kansanshi, etc.). Not apples to apples comparison. Jabal Sayid has tonnes of milled ore disclosed.