Billionaire Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta has been attempting to regain the foremost copper asset since 2019, when KCM was put into provisional liquidation after the earlier authorities accused its proprietor of mendacity about enlargement plans and paying too little tax.
To get entry to the mine once more, Vedanta now must observe the courtroom ruling by releasing $250 million to settle money owed that KCM owes to contractors and suppliers. Vedanta instructed Bloomberg this week that it stands prepared to start out making the funds. Agarwal’s agency has additionally dedicated to investing $1 billion over 5 years to finish enlargement tasks.
Though Konkola’s annual manufacturing capability exceeds 300,000 tons of copper, output of the metallic that’s key to the power transition and whose worth rallied to a file final month slumped to lower than 40,000 tons in 2023.
The flagship operation — Konkola Deep — extends virtually a mile underground. It is among the world’s wettest mines, requiring the equal of 140 Olympic-sized swimming swimming pools to be pumped to the floor each day in an effort to perform.
(By William Clowes)