(Kitco News) -Ivanhoe Mines (TSX: IVN) announced Tuesday that the Kamoa-Kakula Mining Complex in the Democratic Republic of Congo has set a new quarterly production record in Q2 2022, with 87,314 tonnes of copper in concentrate produced.
According to the company’s statement, Kamoa-Kakula's Phase 1 and Phase 2 3.8-million-tonne-per-annum concentrator plants produced 30,379 tonnes of copper in concentrate during June 2022.
Ivanhoe said that this performance marks the third consecutive month that Kamoa-Kakula has surpassed its throughput design capacity of 7.6 million tonnes per annum, following the commissioning of Phase 2.
Importantly, the company added that the Phase 1 and Phase 2 concentrator plants are approaching a combined annualized production rate of approximately 400,000 tonnes of copper in concentrate.
Ivanhoe also noted that the de-bottlenecking program is on track to boost Kamoa Copper's annual production to approximately 450,000 tonnes of copper in concentrate per year by the second quarter of 2023.
The company’s management anticipates that the early commissioning of the Phase 2 concentrator plant in March 2022, approximately four months ahead of schedule, will enable Kamoa Copper to deliver in the upper range of its 2022 production guidance of 290,000 to 340,000 tonnes of copper in concentrate.
Kamoa-Kakula is the world's fastest growing and highest-grade major copper mining complex. Based on independent benchmarking, the project's phased expansion scenario to 19 million tonnes per annum would position Kamoa-Kakula as the world's second-largest copper mining complex, with peak annual copper production of more than 800,000 tonnes.
The Kamoa-Kakula Mining Complex is a joint venture between Ivanhoe Mines (39.6%), Zijin Mining Group (39.6%), Crystal River Global Limited (0.8%) and the Government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (20%).
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