GEOTOUR GUIDE - City of Kamloops

An orebody is an unusual concentration of a metal
or other economic mineral. Typically an element
like copper occurs in trace amounts in most rocks,
perhaps 10-50 parts per million. To form a copper
orebody, Nature must increase the concentration of
copper hundreds to thousands of times. In the case
of Highland Valley orebody, the copper contained in
tens of cubic kilometres of magma was concentrated
into a metal-rich liquid and deposited in a much
smaller volume of rock.
BiG TonnaGes BuT loW Grade.
The Highland Valley orebodies are large tonnage but
low grade copper deposits that require large scale
mining to be economic. Their average copper content
is only about 0.4% copper, that is, one tonne of ore
contains about four kilograms of copper metal. To be
successful, such mining operations have to be very
large, efficient and mechanized. What is “economic”
rock (ore) today may not be tomorrow, depending on
the world price of copper. In 1999, the mine shut down
for a short period when the price of copper dropped
to $0.55 (US) per pound. Beginning in 2004, very high
copper prices of $2.00 to over $3.00 per pound made
the mine very profitable.
Figure 39. The origin of the Highland Valley mine.
Figure 40. Conveyor belts carry football size blocks of ore from the pit to stockpiles
(centre) at the mill (lower left), ready for processing. (Photo by R. Anderson)
Figure 41. The Highland Valley mine includes a series of operations that include mining from an open pit, processing the ore in the mill, storing the waste
materials in tailings ponds and waste rock dumps, and reclaiming the waste rock areas and other disturbed areas with soil cover and vegetation.
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