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Mines/DR Congo

Mutanda mine

Mutanda mine, DR Congo. Producing, open pit, mining cobalt, copper.

Why Mutanda is famous

Glencore's Mutanda produced 103,200 t of copper in 2019, then went to care and maintenance at the end of 2019 because of low cobalt prices.1,2

Story cards

Timeline

  1. 2000 to 2020DRC cobalt boom3

What kind of deposit

Sediment-hosted stratabound copper

Mutanda today

Where cobalt is mined todayWhere copper is mined todayMining in DR Congo

Where next

Events

HereDRC cobalt boomMutanda went to care and maintenance at the end of 2019 because of low cobalt prices.1

Places

Located inKolweziMutanda is about 38 km from Kolwezi.1

Deposit types

An example ofSediment-hosted stratabound copperMutanda belongs to the sediment-hosted stratabound copper family of deposits.4

Sources

  1. Minerals Yearbook 2020-21, volume III: The Mineral Industry of the Democratic Republic of the Congo US Geological Survey
  2. data/minerals/operations.csv Prospector Trails (internal)
  3. China, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and artisanal cobalt mining from 2000 through 2020 (publication page) US Geological Survey
  4. Mineral Deposit Models (Bulletin 1693, Cox and Singer, eds., 1986) US Geological Survey

From the Prospector Trails mining history dataset: each fact links to the source it was checked against. Figures are as the source gives them, in the money of their day. Not investment advice.

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Cover photos from Wikimedia Commons: Malachite on cobaltocalcite, Musonoi by Ji-Elle, CC BY-SA 3.0. Pictures: Kopermijn te Kolwezi in de provincie Shaba (Katanka), Mieremet, Rob / Anefo / Europeana (Public Domain Mark 1.0); Chiquicamata Mine, Chile, NASA/METI/AIST/Japan Space Systems, and U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team (Public domain (NASA media, no copyright)).