Xstrata Copper - Altonorte

Acid Plant Database March 26, 2025

Owner	Glencore - Altonorte Smelter
Location	La Negra, Antofagasta Chile
Background	1995 - Noranda acquired 25% of the Refimet Smelter with the strategy to have a small presence in the Chilean smelter business. 1998 - Noranda acquired 100% of Refimet Formerly Xstrata Copper
Website	www.xstrata.com
Plant	No. 1 Plant Monsanto Plant	No. 2 Plant Lurgi Plant	No. 3 Plant Outotec Plant	No. 1 Plant (New)
Coordinates	23º 49' 37" S, 70º 19' 5" W	23º 49' 36" S, 70º 19' 2" W	23º 49' 35" S, 70º 18' 59" W	-
Type of Plant	Metallurgical	Metallurgical	Metallurgical
Gas Source	Copper	Copper	Copper Noranda Reactor Peirce-Smith Converters (4)
Plant Capacity	541 MTPD	127,000 Nm³/h, 11.4% SO₂	2040 MTPD 175,000 Nm³/h, 12% SO₂	2040 MTPD
SA/DA	SA	4 SA	4 SA	3/1 DA
Status	Shutdown 2003 Demolished	Shutdown Demolished 2009	Operating	Operating
Year Built	1970	1993	2003	2008
Technology	MECS	Lurgi (Outotec)	Lurgi (Outotec)	Lurgi (Outotec)
Contractor	-	-	-	Xstrata
Remarks	The plant was originally built by Monsanto as a single absorption plant and operated by ASARCO, Corpus Christi, Texas, USA.	1982 - The plant was orginally built for Rio Tinto in Huelva, Spain. 1996 - The plant was relocated to its present location 2000 - When Noranda Reactor installed, FCII was awarded job to upgrade the acid plant	-	Plant design is essentially a copy of No. 3 plant but double absorption. Quench tower has a different design than No. 3 plant.
Pictures
Pictures	-
General	ca 2000 - Reverbatory Furnace replaced with an oxygen enriched Noranda Reactor. 2007 - The operational upgrade, with an original investment estimate of US$58 million, will increase production capacity by almost one-third from around 290,000 tonnes a year of copper in anodes to 380,000 tonnes a year. Sulphuric acid production will increase from 800,000 to 1.1 million tonnes a year. In addition, as part of Xstrata Copper’s commitment to being an environmental leader in the mining industry, Altonorte will voluntarily invest a further US$14 million to install double contacts in the new sulphuric acid plant, with the objective of increasing emissions capture from 93% to 95.5%. This will take the total expansion capital to US$72 million. Altonorte is a custom copper smelting operation located near the port of Antofagasta in northern Chile. The smelter has the capacity to process 900,000 tonnes of copper concentrate per year, yielding 290,000 tonnes of anode copper and 800,000 tonnes of sulphuric acid annually. Altonorte began as a concentrate roasting operation in 1988 under the name of Refimet. The company was owned 66.6% by Inversiones del Pacifico and 33.4% by Minera Barrick Chile. In 1993, a copper smelter was built with a design capacity of 235,000 tonnes per annum of concentrate. Four years later the capacity was raised to 390,000 tonnes per annum of concentrate. In 1998, Refimet was acquired by Noranda. The company was renamed Noranda Chile and the smelter became known as Altonorte. A major expansion project costing US$170 million was completed in 2003. The project included the installation of a new concentrate dryer, the replacement of the reverberatory furnace with a continuous reactor, new converters and acid plant, an additional anode furnace, a second casting wheel, and a slag flotation plant. Following the project, sulphur dioxide capture increased to more than 93%. In 2005, Altonorte started to process molybdenum concentrate. In August 2006, Altonorte was acquired by Xstrata as part of the Falconbridge assets. A new expansion is underway to increase capacity to 1.2 million tonnes per annum of copper concentrate.
References	Carrasco, J. and Pierre, B., "Optimization Initiatives at Altonorte on the Path to Becoming a World Class Smelter", Copper 2019, Vancouver, Canada.
News	March 26, 2025 - London-listed miner Glencore has declared force majeure on copper shipments from its Chilean Altonorte smelter, where production has been suspended, two industry sources said. Companies declare force majeure when unexpected circumstances prevent them from meeting contractual obligations. The sources did not know how long operations at Altonorte, which has capacity to produce 350,000 metric tons of copper a year in anode form, would be suspended. Glencore declined to comment. Altonorte’s output is a fraction of refined global copper supplies estimated at around 26 million tons, but a long suspension could widen the deficit some analysts are expecting this year. Much of the copper produced in Chile is shipped to the U.S., where prices on COMEX have soared to record highs on worries about shortages due to tariffs on imports of the metal used in the power and construction industries. The most active copper contract on COMEX for settlement in May hit $5.3740 a lb or $11,847 a ton on Wednesday. The force majeure was first reported by Bloomberg on Tuesday.

MTPD - Metric Tonne per Day STPD - Short Ton per Day
MTPA - Metric Tonne per Annum STPA - Short Ton per Annum
SA - Single Absorption
DA - Double Absorption

* Coordinates can be used to locate plant on Google Earth


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