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In Siberia, a copper mine hopes to become a global energy pivot
Holding more than 26 million tonnes of copper, the mine claims to be the largest untapped deposit in Russia and the third largest in the world.
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This photograph taken on September 27, 2021 shows a view of the Udokan copper industrial complex under construction in eastern Siberia's Zabaikalsky region. (AFP/Natalia Kolesnikova)
I
n 1949, a Soviet expedition in Siberia was looking for uranium to supply the national nuclear arsenal when it stumbled on a vast deposit of copper.
More than 70 years later, a mining complex in Russia's Far East between Lake Baikal and the Pacific Ocean is finally due to launch operations next year.
With copper key to the world's energy transition away from carbon, the hope is it will be a boon for Russia and beyond.
The project is "a long-awaited event in the life of the Far East and the entire mining industry of Russia and the world," said Valery Kazikayev, chairman of Udokan Copper, the company developing the site.
Kazikayev, who makes the nine-hour journey by plane from Moscow to the mine twice a month, brought AFP journalists on a tour late September.
At an altitude of 2,000 metres (6,500 feet), the heavy snow covering the mine offers a glimpse at the difficulty of rendering it operable.
"The Soviet Union wasn't able to develop these deposits," Kazikayev, 66, said at the site, where construction began in 2019.
