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Norilsk Nickel finalizes construction of Bystrinsky mining plant

CHITA, August 21. /TASS/. Russia’s Norilsk Nickel company has approached the final stage at construction of the Bystrinsky Mining and Processing Plant in southern Transbaikalia, press service of the Bystrinskoye Company told TASS on Monday.

"The readiness of the facilities is approaching 100%, installation and commissioning continue," the press service said. "The plant will be put operational in the fourth quarter of the current year."

By 2020, the plant will produce 70-75 million tons of copper a year.

"Over the first ten years of the plant’s work, the regional budget will receive more than 18 billion rubles in taxes, and the plant will offer more than 3,000 jobs," the press service said.

The Bystrinsky Mining and Processing Plant is on the list of Norilsk Nickel’s first-class assets. The project began in 2007, with the total investments of about $1.7 billion.

The plant is constructed on the base of a copper-iron-gold deposit, where the reser ds[jl yves are estimated at 2.1 million tons of copper, 7.6 million ounces of gold, 34.1 million ounces of silver and 67 million tons of magnetite iron. It is among the ten biggest copper deposits in the world. The Company has built production facilities (a concentrator, open-pit mines, tailings pit, etc.) and amenities, and the Borzya - Gazimursky Zavod railway of 227 km with the capacity of at least of 4 mtpa of cargo. The deposit is 300 km from the border between Russia and China, and China would be the key market for the plant’s copper concentrate. Norilsk Nickel also considers entering markets of the Asia-Pacific Region.