green finish, page-4

I think that will explain the rush...


BHP Billiton Announces Massive Copper Find In Chile
23/07/2008 1:30PM
SANTIAGO (AFP)--British-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton (BBL) announced Tuesday a new copper find near its Minera Escondida mine in northern Chile, a vein estimated to yield at least one billion tons of the valuable metal.

"In order to properly and rapidly evaluate identified exploration targets, decisions were recently made to aggressively expand the exploration and development drilling program" in the area, the company said in a report.

The new Pampa Escondida project, as it is called, was discovered during extensive exploration of the area begun in recent years, it said.

"Drilling to date suggests that Pampa Escondida contains at least one billion metric tons of porphyry style mineralization," the report added.

The BHP Billiton finding follows last Thursday's announcement by Chilean state-run mining group Codelco, the biggest copper producer in the world, of a copper find called "Casualidad" with an estimated yield of 300 million tons.

Minera Escondida is the world's biggest copper mine, which produced a record 6.5 billion dollars of copper last year.

Chile is the world's biggest producer of copper, which is used for electrical wiring and plumbing.


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July 22, 2008 23:30 ET (03:30 GMT)

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