China to Add 100K T Copper Capacity Next Month

BEIJING, Aug. 25 -- China is boosting copper production capacity to feed expanding domestic consumption, although its dependence on imported concentrates and scrap will rise.

    Privately-owned Huada Group in Zhejiang province will start full production at a new 100,000-tonne-a-year copper smelter in Jiangxi province in late September, a company source said on Friday.

    Huada, a newcomer to copper smelting, has investments in property, finances and trading businesses and is an enduser of copper and steel.

    "We are going to use a third of the refined copper cathodes from the smelter and the rest will be sold domestically," the source added.

    The firm produced copper-based telecommunication wires in Hanzhou city in Zhejiang and would start production of copper rod, wires and cables after the Jiangxi smelter startup, he said.

    Huada had already started operating 50,000 tonnes of capacity at Jiangxi last month and would kick off the other 50,000 tonnes of capacity next month, the source said. The smelter can use copper concentrates or scrap as feed.

    "We believe copper production is a profitable business. The government also encourages this."To feed China's insatiable copper appetite, which sucked in record imports in the year's first half and has helped drive up London Metal Exchange prices <MCU3> nearly 100 percent this year, at least another 300,000 tonnes of smelting capacity will come on stream within two years.

    A copper subsidiary of gold producer Zijin Mining and nickel producer Xinjiang Xinxin Mining is building a 100,000-tonne-a-year copper smelter in China's northwest and construction would be completed in about 2 years, Zijin's spokesman Zheng Yuqiang said.

    "We are a minor shareholder of the smelter. Xinxin is the majority shareholder," he added.

    Zijin was also working on a project to build a 200,000-tonne smelting and refining copper plant in Fujian that is expected to be completed in 2 years from now, Zheng said.

    China, the world's top copper consumer, produced 1.7 percent more refined copper, at 2.25 million tonnes, in the first seven months of 2009 from a year earlier but mined less than a third of its needs of concentrate.

    It relied on imported material for refined copper production, with July's imports of copper scrap surging by two-thirds from June to 450,000 tonnes.

    Imports of copper concentrate are expected to reach 510,000 tonnes in July after June's all-time record of 656,031 tonnes.

    (Source: Reuters)