(Yicai Global) July 1 -- Mining giant China Molybdenum said it will invest more than USD1.8 billion in the first phase of the Kisanfu project in the Democratic Republic of Congo, one of the world’s largest and top-grade copper and cobalt mines, to meet surging demand from the new energy sector.

China Molybdenum will spend USD1.4 billion on engineering, USD161 million on other construction work, and USD238 million on reserve costs for the KFM project, whose main products are cathode copper, crude cobalt hydroxide, and a small amount of copper and cobalt sulfide concentrate, the Luoyang-based company announced yesterday.

The miner acquired a 95 percent stake in the KFM project for USD550 million through its unit KFM Holding in December 2020. In April 2021, it sold 25 percent of the unit to Chinese power battery giant Contemporary Amperex Technology’s Ningbo Brunp CATL New Energy for USD137.5 million.

The project, which began preparation in March last year and will start production in the first half of next year, is expected to deliver an average of 90,000 tons of copper and 30,000 tons of cobalt a year after reaching full output.

Prices of the project’s main products are yet to be set, as the overseas investment is greatly affected by the political and economic environment, policies, laws, and regulations in the DRC, China Molybdenum added.

Its Tenke Fungurume mixed mining project in the DRC will also go into operation in 2023. The company, which is already the world’s largest cobalt producer with a total capacity of 5.6 million tons, equal to 22 percent of the global total, will also become the biggest supplier of cobalt, a cathode material for ternary batteries used in new energy vehicles.

Shares of China Molybdenum [SHA: 603993] dipped 0.4 percent today to finish at CNY5.71 (85 US cents) apiece.

Editor: Futura Costaglione