Metal Products News
- Mineral, oil deposits found along Tibet rail
Date: 26-Jan-2007 Sources: (Shenzhen Daily)
GEOLOGISTS have found deposits of copper, iron, lead and zinc ore along the Qinghai-Tibet Railway route, domestic media said Thursday, adding that the area may also have petroleum potential.
The country in 2006 opened a railway to the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, paving the wave for a flood of investment in the poor, remote region but also prompting warnings from activists that such development could endanger the plateau's fragile environment.
Already, mining firms have permanently booked cars on the train to ferry employees to Qinghai and Tibet, domestic media reported last year.
Total possible reserves could equal more than 20 million tons of copper and 10 million tons of lead and zinc, Xinhua said, citing the country's top geological surveyor Meng Xianlai, director of the China Geological Survey (CGS) under the Ministry of Land and Resources.
Deposits include the Yulong copper find in the Tibet Autonomous Region, with a proven reserve of 7.89 million tons, Meng said, second only to the country's largest copper mine operated by Jiangxi Copper.
Yulong Copper Co.'s major shareholders are Zijin Mining Group Co., China's second-largest gold miner, and Western Mining Co., one of the country's largest mining and development companies.
The government is now working on extending the railway to Shigatse, Tibet, which would allow greater access to remote deposits including Yulong.
Estimated reserves of 760 million tons of high-grade iron ore were found in the Kunlun Mountains on the western Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and southern Xinjiang, said Zhang Hongtao, deputy director of the CGS.
The mid-western part of the northern Qiangtang basin in northern Tibet, which is also along the railway, has favorable conditions for oil and gas and promising reserves, Xinhua quoted Zhang as saying.
Exploration of mineral resources along the railway is significant to the railway's efficient use, regional economic development and meeting China's resource demands, Xinhua said.
Mineral discoveries since 1999, including three major copper deposits in Yulong and in Yunan Province's Pulang and Yangla regions, will add 26.78 million tons of copper to the country's mineral reserves and reduce national dependence on imports, Xinhua said, citing Zhang.
'Once the three copper deposits are exploited, they will increase the total output of China's copper mines by almost a third,'he was quoted as saying.
China's copper mines produce about 700,000 tons of copper concentrate a year.
China is the world's largest copper consumer and importer of refined copper. It imported 827,021 tons of refined copper in 2006, to feed its booming economy.
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