American engineering company Bechtel announced this week that it opened in Chile the Bechtel Mining & Metals Innovation Center with the goal of developing new technologies that boost productivity, promote environmental sustainability and improve worker safety for the copper industry.
In a press release, Bechtel said that the center, which is located in Santiago, is the result of an initiative that begun three years ago with the idea of leveraging the company’s construction expertise and copper concentrator design to achieve greater efficiencies in mining projects.
“The innovations Bechtel already has developed will enable a step change in construction productivity to deliver safe, high-quality projects faster, at lower cost and reduced risk. These innovations are now available to our copper industry customers,” the company’s brief reads.
According to Bechtel, one of the main focuses of the unit will be on developing new mechanisms that improve product recovery and decrease water and power consumption. If properly applied, such technologies are expected to reduce miners’ operational costs.
In Chile, the Virginia-based firm was in charge of BHP’s (ASX:BHP) Escondida mine water desalination plant. The 2,500-l/s plant was finished at a cost of $3,430 million. It included two 42” pipelines to transport seawater 3,200 m above sea level from the Port of Antofagasta, four high-pressure pumping stations, a reservoir at the mine and high-voltage electricity infrastructure to operate the system. Escondida is the world’s largest copper mine.
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