On the occasion of PERUMIN 36, Felipe Moraga, leader of the Mining Division for South Latin America, shared some previews of the presentation of Nalco Water, a global company providing water and process management solutions. “We have been working hard throughout South America, from the main copper producer, Chile, to Peru, Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia,” the expert stated in the following exclusive interview.

What are Nalco Water's objectives in relation to PERUMIN 36?

Our company has been growing year after year for a century thanks to our capacity for continuous innovation, developing science-based solutions and delivering world-class service to our customers. This legacy has positioned us as a world leader in water treatment solutions and services for a variety of industries, including mining. Therefore, we have unique capabilities to innovate and deliver solutions that meet the needs of our customers today.

Thus, being present at PERUMIN, one of the most important mining industry events in the region, not only enables us to be closer to our customers, connect with them and better understand their greatest challenges, but also to show them how we are innovating to help them solve those challenges, and also, the way we are expanding our offers specifically in the flotation market.

How do you contribute to water and process management in the mining industry?

At Nalco Water, an Ecolab company, we help our customers manage water wisely with products, technologies and expertise that improve productivity and minimize operating costs, enabling water efficiency, energy savings and carbon footprint reduction to minimize environmental impacts. This is accomplished through innovative alternatives to tailings management and water reclamation, such as Water Shed. It is also achieved by promoting products, and scale and corrosion inhibitors that ensure the reliability of assets (water transport to the concentrator).

Our main contribution is to understand the challenges and offer products that solve today's problems in the mining industry with environmentally safe products, accepted by global regulatory institutions.

On the other hand, in terms of processes, we know that the demand for base metals in the world market is increasing, which means that we are helping the concentrator plants to improve the recovery of these base metals through flotation products.

What new trends are emerging in ore processing?

Among the new trends, some examples are the use of seawater and desalinated water for ore processing plants; the flotation of coarser ores (increased ore processing matching or exceeding standard recovery); the operation with low grade ores and high geological complexity (clays, oxides, primary minerals); and the use of new technologies of flotation cells, mills that change the current balance of mining (chemical specialization is required).

What are the main water management challenges in Peruvian mining?

In the mining industry, one of the greatest challenges is to minimize the impact on the environment and communities. As a result, mining operations seek to control the use of water resources, improving the reuse of process water and reducing the use of natural sources to minimize environmental impact.

This translates into increasing water recovery from tailings dams, ensuring compliance with environmental standards for the disposal of water to natural sources, improving the efficiency of the concentrator water recovery process, and reducing the cost of water in USD/m3 and the use of energy for transporting water to the process.

How will you increase your participation in the mining sector and how much do you aspire to grow?

We have a clear and consistent objective of increasing our participation in the mining industry through different aspects, developing environmentally friendly chemicals that can treat water in the concentrator plants, as well as positively impacting the production of base metals.

We are also aware that new digitalization methodologies come along with mining development and we are one of the few companies that has been supporting this vision, offering the market a tool called FLOTATION 360, which integrates all ore processing, maximizing recovery in the plant.

Our vision is that we can bring value to all mining operations and we face the challenges of these operations as our own, working through a research center dedicated to the mining industry.

What new projects with mining companies will you be implementing in the near future?

We have been working hard throughout South America, from the main copper producer, Chile, to Peru, Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia, developing solutions for different operations specifically with the objective of improving the production of base metal fines. In addition, we would also like to mention that we are following the global trend on the treatment of lithium ores for their production. Finally, we can point out that we have made an important investment precisely to position Nalco Water, an Ecolab company, within the large-scale mining sector as the best strategic partner.