Business profile
Northparkes is a copper and gold mine
located 27 kilometres north west of Parkes in the Central West of
New South Wales, Australia. Northparkes is a joint venture between
Rio Tinto (80%) and the
Sumitomo Group (20%).
The majority of our employees and their families live in the Parkes
Shire, a diverse municipality centered in the town of Parkes, a
thriving country town of about 12,000 residents. Parkes' primary
industry is agriculture but growth over recent decades from
industrial, transport and mining sectors now means there is a
diverse economic base in the town.
Northparkes operates underground block cave mines on its mining
leases. Northparkes was the first in the country to use a variation
of the cost-effective block cave mining technique in its
underground operations. Underground block cave operations include
the E26 Lift 2 and Lift 2 North (Lift 2N) block caves as well as
the E48 block cave project. Open cut mining campaigns have been
undertaken in the E26, E22 and E27 pits.
Northparkes' ore is processed on site
to produce a high-grade copper concentrate which is then
transported by road train to the Goonumbla rail siding
approximately 13 kilometres from the mine. The containers are then
placed on to a train and transported to Port Kembla, south of
Wollongong, where the concentrate is then shipped to customers
primarily in Japan, China and India.
Northparkes Mines owns 6000 hectares of land around the mine, of
which the mining lease covers 1630 hectares. The remaining land is
actively farmed using best practice farming methods developed and
adopted to maximise productivity and quality while conserving water
and soils.