Teck CEO Don Lindsay
Canadian diversified miner Teck Resources is studying further copper expansions beyond Phase 2 of its Quebrada Blanca (QB) mine and says is up to Chile, which is considering new tax and royalty structures, to offer an attractive investment environment.
CEO Don Lindsay said on a conference call last week that Teck would “wait and see” what the final rules were before sanctioning a further investment at its massive QB project.
“It is in Chile’s hands to put together a good investment environment, and it has done that for decades. Frankly, Chile’s been one of the best countries in the world to be mining copper in, and I’m a big believer that it will continue to do so,” he said on a February 24 call.
Teck VP corporate affairs and sustainability South America, Amparo Cornejo, added that there was no indication that the mining royalty deal currently under discussion would have an impact on the stability of agreements already in place. “International agreements and commitments will be respected.”
Commenting on the Constitutional Convention process under way, Cornejo said that discussions about environmental issues or others that could have an impact on mining were expected to be voted on by mid-March.
Teck is currently ramping up work at Quebrada Blanca Phase 2 (QB2), which will start producing copper concentrate in the second half of 2022. QB2 will produce about 316 000 t/y of copper-equivalent production over the first five years of a 28-year mine life.
The next phase of development would be the Quebrada Blanca Mill Expansion (QBME), Lindsay said, explaining that it would entail an increase in concentrator throughput of about 50%, with the addition of one identical, semi-autogenous grinding line.
“We believe this configuration optimises the timeline to obtain approvals, the permitting process and to progress the development of this world-class orebody, while leveraging existing infrastructure that we are building right now for maximum capital efficiency.”
He explained that its expansion proposal should fall under the current tax stability agreement and within the current permitting for some infrastructure that was already there.
The QBME prefeasibility study (PFS), including environmental baseline activities, started in the final quarter of 2021 and will be completed in the fourth quarter of this year. First production is targeted for 2026.
Copper production is a key growth focus for Teck, which is transitioning its portfolio to metals as a shift to a lower carbon economy drives new demand. Lindsay said 2022 would be a year of transformation for the group, as it “really starts ramping up copper output” with production from QB2 only months away.
Other copper opportunities include the Zafranal copper and gold project, in Peru, for which a feasibility study had been completed. Teck has received confirmation of the project’s social and environmental impact assessment admissibility in the first quarter.
At San Nicolás, in Mexico, work on a feasibility study recently started with completion targeted in the fourth quarter of 2023. Partnering negotiations for San Nicolás were ongoing and first production was targeted for 2026.
At Galore Creek, in Canada, Fluor was appointed to undertake a PFS starting in the first quarter of 2022, with completion targeted in the first half of 2023.