Codelco Ministro Hales Lime milk plant

On September 1, 2010, Codelco’s Board of Directors at the time decided to create the Ministro Hales Division, the youngest of the Corporation, to increase the value of the state-owned company through the exploitation and processing of minerals from the deposit, originally known as Mansa Mina.

The project, led by Codelco’s Corporate Vice-Presidency, included the realization of the mine area, material removal and construction of the open pit mine; the infrastructure, where the facilities for maintenance services and the administration and engineering facilities would be located; the concentrator plant, with the processes of primary crushing, belt transport, stockpiling, milling and flotation; and the roasting plant.

PA Engineering, together with Echeverría Izquierdo, presented a project for the EPC engineering and construction of two lime milk plants for the new Ministro Hales Division, one to feed the grinding plant for the flotation process and the other for the neutralization of effluents in the roasting plant. The proposal included Project management, engineering, procurement of equipment (including offshore fabrication inspection) and materials, project management, site engineering and construction technical support, commissioning and start-up of the two units.

The project was developed between 2012 and 2013, for two storage silos (750 ton) and lime milk preparation systems (8.6 ton/h) equipped with the largest slakers available in the industry (12 t7h) for the Concentrator and Roasting plants. In addition, the interconnection of services to the slurry preparation systems was made from the existing grate to each of the respective systems.

Finally, connections were made to the concentrator and roasting electrical room (subway duct bank) and connections to the concentrator and roasting control room (signal repeater via fiber optics, subway duct bank).

On January 5, 2016, the open pit mine was officially inaugurated, located at an altitude of 2,600 meters and almost 10 kilometres north of Calama along the road that connects this city with Chuquicamata. It is currently one of the most modern copper production complexes in the country and produces copper calcine, copper concentrate and silver.

According to Codelco’s website, the hallmark of Ministro Hales is determined using technology and innovation in its processes, with an operation that respects environmental regulations and is in permanent contact with the communities. In 2020 it produced 170,606 metric tons of fine copper and 260,981 kilos of silver.