Celebrating 30 years of the ISASMELT™

Mount Isa Mines (MIM) and Glencore Technology have been at the forefront of developing innovative processes and technologies that have been successfully implemented into many of the world's largest mining operations.

As we celebrate 30 years since the ISASMELT™ technology was commissioned, we reflect on the innovative Mount Isa Mines spirit that found a remarkable solution to energy efficiency and improved environmental performance for smelting operations around the world.

Historic smelting operations were not very energy efficient nor were they environmentally friendly. By the early 1970s, MIM was engineering technological advancements and innovative solutions in smelting to address these issues.

With declining metal prices and rising costs of processing due to complex ore bodies, MIM mitigated the impact of these challenges through engineering a ground-breaking solution.

Today’s ISASMELT™ is the world’s highest-performing smelting technology in terms of its flexibility of feeds, fast ramp-up, lower operational expenses, availability, campaign life, control systems and ease of use, safety and environmental performance. 

One of the key factors to the success of the ISASMELT™ has been the continuous real-world feedback that still drives the technology’s evolution to this day.  Each smelter installation has seen improvements learned from prior operations such as extending the life of lances, improving oxygen enrichment, improving campaign life, and improving emissions capture.

Let’s step back to the 1980s, when MIM needed to secure the longevity of its smelter. MIM engaged CSIRO to apply their SIROSMELT concept to MIM’s own lead and copper smelting operations.

Two smelters were constructed in the 1980s to test and develop the idea.  Demonstration plants were subsequently built, successfully operated and further improved upon. Commercial smelters were built in the early 1990s and their notable performance attracted the attention of operations worldwide.

The commercial rollout of the licensed ISASMELT™ technology began during the same decade. The first external operations to adopt the technology included Freeport McMoran in the USA, Vedanta in India, Umicore in Belgium, Aurubis in Germany and Yunnan in China. The total capacity of all ISASMELT™ plants worldwide is now well over 10 million tonnes per year.

The latest application of the ISASMELT™ technology is treating e-scrap in the circular economy as the world is turning its attention to recycling secondary copper and minimising waste and environmental footprint.

This flexibility, environmental performance and range means ISASMELT™ is strongly positioned to lead the world into its next phase of metals smelting.

The technology arm of MIM, Glencore Technology, is dedicated to marketing our innovations around the world, and continuously developing new solutions to improve efficiencies and keep mining operations viable.