Freeport Smelters In Gresik Officially Operate, Can Produce 60 Tons Of Gold Per Year

PTFI President Director Tony Wenas (photo; screenshot)

JAKARTA - The government inaugurated the second copper smelter belonging to PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI) at the Java Integrated Industrial and Ports Estate (JIIPE), Gresik, East Java, today. The smelter can produce 60 tons and 220 tons of copper per year.

PTFI President Director Tony Wenas said that the newly inaugurated smelter was successfully completed within five years. Where for 1.5 years it is used for land compactification.

"Alhamdulillah, we can inaugurate the PTFI operation which is quite challenging to complete it," he said at the inauguration of the Gresik Smelter operation, quoted from YouTube Freeport Indonesia, Thursday, June 27.

"We can achieve it, we can adjust it according to schedule and not thanks to the support of all parties," he continued.

Tony also said the newly inaugurated smelter is the largest single line smelter in the world and has a production capacity of up to 1.7 million tons of copper concentrate.

Meanwhile, the output of this smelter produces 600,000 to 700,000 copper cathodes.

"It can also be refined here in December, later on, the anode lumput will produce gold and silver as well as several other metals, the amount of gold is approximately 50 to 60 tons, the silver is 220 tons per year," he said.

Furthermore, Tony said that even though it had been inaugurated, the smelter could not produce immediately. Because it requires awatty to heat everything up.

This smelter can produce copper cathode, which is estimated to start around August. So for information, we are starting to operate, it will take about 6 to 10 weeks to heat everything up to reach a certain hot spot," he said.