Freeport Concentrate Export Drops as Production Drops
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10 January 2019 08:02 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Freeport Indonesia's copper concentrate export is expected to free fall following the drop in production this year.
The Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM) Ministry’s mineral business development Director Yunus Saefulhak said that Freeport’s concentrate production of 1.2 million tons this year had dropped compared to last year’s 2.1 million tons.
“Around 200,000 of those are exported and a million of it is processed at the smelter in Gresik,” said Yunus at the ESDM Ministry headquarters on Wednesday, January 9.
Read: Freeport to Close Grasberg Mine Operation
As a comparison, Freeport was able to daily produce 270,000 tons of copper ores which was used to produce 2 million tons of concentrates. Out of that number, 1.2 million tons were exported and 800,000 of them were processed at the Gresik smelter in East Java.
Yunus explained that Freeport’s drop in production is mainly caused by the shift from an open pit mine into an undergrounds mine at the Grasberg Mine.
President Director of Indonesia Asahan Alumunium (Inalum) Budi Gunadi Sadikin said that the Grasberg underground mine is yet to produce ores stably before the year 2023 and asserted that it is not because of depleting mineral reserves.
CAESAR AKBAR
