TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - PT Freeport Indonesia or PTFI will be reactivating its ore mill operation factory on March 21, 2017. Their mill operation was halted since February 10, 2017, since Freeport could not export their copper product. In addition, the operation of copper concentrate refinement at PT Smelting in Gresik, East Java, that handles 40 percent of PTFI’s production each year also halted.
Most of the copper concentrates are sold overseas. There are at least six countries that have their copper concentrate supplied from PT Freeport Indonesia. The countries include Spain (2 percent), South Korea (3 percent), China (10 percent), India (26 percent), Philippines (7 percent), and Japan (15 percent). This caused the copper concentrates that have been processed earlier to stockpile in their warehouse.
Read: Freeport Indonesia Halts Production
Three warehouses with the capacity of 40,000 to 45,000 tons copper concentrate are already in its full capacity. In a normal situation, before the export permit expired, the total copper concentrate that stockpiles in the three warehouses only go up to 20,000 tons.
PTFI spokesperson Riza Pratama stated that the mill is ready to be fully operational again since they have received certainty about the follow-up on refinery activities at their factories. The smelter company, which 25 percent of its stock is owned by PT Freeport Indonesia, has started their production since March 2, 2017.
“We plan on operating the mill again on March 21, 2017, even though it won’t be 100 percent operational,” he said on Thursday, March 9, 2017.
Read: Freeport's Gold Mine in Papua Largest in the World
Riza explained that as long as they could not export their ores, the level of production will be based on the ability of the smelting to take in the concentrates.
The limited production has already begun when the company started the process of ore mining at the Grasberg's open and the underground mines.
BISNIS.COM
