Japan Copper Smelters Secure More Scrap, Alternative Copper Sources

Japanese copper smelters try to use more copper scrap and anode copper when the copper content in concentrate gets lower. Mitsubishi Materials launched new scrap yard in Tokyo while Nippon Mining & Metals and Pan Pacific Copper expand consumption of the alternative copper materials.

Mitsubishi Materials started operation of yard to stock waste substrates in coastal area of Tokyo. The firm tries to increase the scrap generation with the new yard while the firm accepts the scrap at Naoshima smelter in Kagawa and Onahama smelter in Fukushima.

Pan Pacific Copper increases consumption of copper scrap, copper slag and crude copper. The firm increases the weight of such alternative materials to 20% from 12% 2 years ago. Japanese crude copper import doubled in 2007 from 2006. The import was 6,969 tonnes in June, which represented around a third of total import in 2007.

Crude copper ore contained 1-2% of copper. However, existing mines now produce ore with less than 1% of copper and some ore contains only 0.5%. Concentrate’s copper content decreases to less than 30% from former more than 30% recently. Copper smelters reduce copper ingot output partly due to the lower copper content.