The Çöpler mine () is a gold mine located in

Erzincan Province Erzincan Province (; ; ) is a Provinces of Turkey, province in the Eastern Anatolia Region of Turkey. In Turkey, its capital is also called Erzincan. Its area is 11,815 km2, and its population is 239,223 (2022). Geography Erzincan is trav ...

, eastern Turkey. It is owned and operated by the Anagold Mining Inc., established in 2009. Explored in 1999, it is on an epithermal gold-silver-copper ore deposit, one of the largest in Turkey and in the world. The Çöpler mine started production in 2010.

Background

Following the exploration of the

epithermal Hydrothermal circulation in its most general sense is the circulation of hot water (Ancient Greek ὕδωρ, ''water'',Liddell, H.G. & Scott, R. (1940). ''A Greek-English Lexicon. revised and augmented throughout by Sir Henry Stuart Jones. with th ...

gold-silver-copper

ore deposit Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically including metals, concentrated above background levels, and that is economically viable to mine and process. The grade of ore refers to the concentration ...

in 1999 near the Çöpler village in the

İliç İliç (from , ''Lichk'') is a town in Erzincan Province in the Eastern Anatolia Region of Turkey. It is the seat of İliç District.Erzincan Province Erzincan Province (; ; ) is a Provinces of Turkey, province in the Eastern Anatolia Region of Turkey. In Turkey, its capital is also called Erzincan. Its area is 11,815 km2, and its population is 239,223 (2022). Geography Erzincan is trav ...

, eastern Turkey, the company Anagold Alacer Inc. was founded by the American Alacer Gold Corp. and the Turkish Lidya Mining Co., a subsidiary of the

Çalık Holding Çalık Holding is a Turkish company that has been operating in the energy, construction, mining, textile, and finance sectors since the 1980s. Founder and chairman Ahmet Çalık began his business career in the textile industry, founding Orta D ...

in an 80/20-share basis. The construction works in the mine called Çöpler began in 2009. Gold production started by December 2010. In 2008, the mining project received approval for the

Environmental impact assessment Environmental impact assessment (EIA) is the assessment of the environmental impact, environmental consequences of a plan, policy, program, or actual projects prior to the decision to move forward with the proposed action. In this context, the te ...

(EIA). In 2020, Alacer Gold Corp. merged with the Canadian SSR Mining Inc., which moved its headquarters from Canada to

Denver Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

Colorado Colorado is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States. It is one of the Mountain states, sharing the Four Corners region with Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. It is also bordered by Wyoming to the north, Nebraska to the northeast, Kansas ...

, United States. The company expanded the mining area from to around and deepened the open-pit mine in a capacity expansion in accordance with two new EIA reports in 2014 and 2021. In 2019, production with 39 types of chemicals plus sulfuric acid and cyanide was switched from cyanide production. The company added to the mining area in August 2023 without the need of an EAI report.

Geology

Çöpler is an epithermal

porphyry Porphyry (; , ''Porphyrios'' "purple-clad") may refer to: Geology * Porphyry (geology), an igneous rock with large crystals in a fine-grained matrix, often purple, and prestigious Roman sculpture material * Shoksha porphyry, quartzite of purple c ...

copper-gold ore deposit, which forms part of the Middle Eocene Çöpler–Kabataş magmatic complex in central-eastern Turkey that formed on the north-eastern margin of the Tauride-Anatolide microcontinent. The intrusive rocks at Çöpler were emplaced into Late Paleozoic-

Mesozoic The Mesozoic Era is the Era (geology), era of Earth's Geologic time scale, geological history, lasting from about , comprising the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous Period (geology), Periods. It is characterized by the dominance of archosaurian r ...

metamorphosed sedimentary rocks. Dating of igneous rocks indicate a brief magmatic and hydrothermal history at Çöpler less than a million year long about 43.8–44.6 Ma. The composition of magma indicate that it was generated in a convergent margin. Çöpler is, however, located too far away from the Maden–Helete arc, and therefore must have formed in a back-arc setting, similar to that in the Bingham Canyon Mine, Utah, United States. The active Bingöl-Yedisu Fault runs across the mine area.

Mining

Çöpler is an

open-pit mining Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique that extracts rock (geology), rock or minerals from the earth. Open-pit mines are used when deposits of commercially ...

operation that obtains gold from oxide ore by

heap leaching Heap leaching is an industrial mining process used to extract precious metals, copper, uranium, and other compounds from ore using a series of chemical reactions that absorb specific minerals and re-separate them after their division from other e ...

process, and from sulfur ore by pressurized oxidation cycle (POX) method, respectively. While the POX facility is a first in terms of gold production in Turkey, it is also one of the few POX facilities in the world. By June 2019, the company reported that it is planned to extract more than 10 million

ounce The ounce () is any of several different units of mass, weight, or volume and is derived almost unchanged from the , an Ancient Roman unit of measurement. The avoirdupois ounce (exactly ) is avoirdupois pound; this is the United States ...

(oz) of gold. As of end 2022, the proven and probable mineral reserves are given as 47.7 million tonnes at an average grade of 2.11 g/t or 3.2 million oz of contained gold, excluding stockpiles. In the first ten years, about 2 Moz (56.7 t) gold was produced. The mine has more than 5 Moz (around 142 t) of gold resources planned to be produced in the next few decades. The partners have invested more than 1 billion US$, making one of the largest investments made in Turkish mining and eastern Turkey.

Environment pollution and mining accidents

It was claimed that 1.72 million tons of toxic chemicals would poison the soil and water for many years in the Çöpler mine, which discharge 9,000 tons of toxic waste and of water. It was observed that birds died after drinking water from the waste dams. On 21 June 2022, a flange on a

cyanide In chemistry, cyanide () is an inorganic chemical compound that contains a functional group. This group, known as the cyano group, consists of a carbon atom triple-bonded to a nitrogen atom. Ionic cyanides contain the cyanide anion . This a ...

pipeline in the heap leaching field separated causing leakage, and cyanide spread into the environment. It was determined that the water resources and soil of the region were contaminated with cyanide. The mine's activities were stopped for a short time by the Ministry. An administrative fine of 16.441 million Turkish lira (ca. 1 million US$) was imposed on the mine company. Operation resumed on 23 September the same year. On 13 February 2024 a disaster occurred when a huge mass of heap leach material slid towards a creek, and nine miners were trapped under the landslide. Eight suspects were detained as responsible, and then put before the

magistrates' court A magistrates' court is a lower court where, in several Jurisdiction (area), jurisdictions, all criminal proceedings start. Also some civil matters may be dealt with here, such as family proceedings. Courts * Magistrates' court (England and Wales) ...

after their statements at the prosecutor's office. Six of the suspects, including the Canadian-national company manager, were arrested while two suspects were released on probation.

References

Sources

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Copler Mine Gold mines in Turkey Open-pit mines İliç District