Germany's Aurubis to ramp up new US copper recycling facility

By Pratima Desai

SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Aurubis will be ramping up its copper recycling smelter in the U.S. this year, the German company's CEO Toralf Haag told Reuters on Wednesday, adding Aurubis sees more potential for investment in future years.

Aurubus has invested $800 million building the project, which took four years. Haag said it will process 180,000 metric tons of complex copper scrap and produce 70,000 tons of refined metal annually.

"North America is an attractive market. There is no large recycling facility in North America up to now, the majority of the scrap is exported," Haag said in an interview on the sidelines of the CESCO and CRU copper conferences.

The U.S. exported nearly 960,000 tons of copper scrap last year, according to information provider Trade Data Monitor (TDM), of which 41% was shipped to China, 11% to Canada and 10% to Thailand.

U.S. President Donald Trump has ordered an investigation on the potential for import tariffs on copper including scrap, aiming to encourage more local production of the metal used in the power and construction industries.

"The decision to invest in a recycling operation could play an even more important role now, having a facility in the U.S. is beneficial for us," Haag said, adding that the site in Richmond was Aurubis' only operation in the U.S.

Aurubis could invest in further recycling capacity in the U.S. "Currently Aurubis focuses on delivering on the Richmond project," Haag said.

Sources of copper scrap include the auto industry and cables from telecoms companies. Aurubis expects data centres to be a source of scrap in the future.

"Copper in data centres lasts three to five years, then it needs to be replaced because the technology is moving so fast."

Data centres for artificial intelligence are expected to be a major source of future copper demand.

(Reporting by Pratima Desai; Editing by David Gregorio)