SiTration and BHP Launch Copper Valorisation Pilot in Arizona's Globe-Miami District

SiTration and BHP have launched two pilot deployments at the historic Copper Cities site in Arizona's Globe-Miami district to trial SiTration's copper valorisation technology on legacy material. The programme starts this month with a small-scale pilot focused on validating continuous, autonomous copper production, targeting low-grade or previously uneconomic resources.

SiTration's process is framed as a 'valorisation' technology, targeting value recovery from legacy or secondary materials. Continuous, autonomous operation is a stated design goal, implying minimal operator intervention and high process automation.

The collaboration pairs a technology start-up (SiTration) with a major copper producer (BHP) on BHP-owned ground. This pilot follows the earlier five-week BHP Invent/Copper South Australia trial on copper waste streams, signalling that the electro-extraction tech is moving from short bench-scale campaigns into site-specific field deployments across multiple continents.

The US Department of Energy's commitment of up to $162 million for tailings and abandoned mine recovery projects suggests that work at historic sites like Copper Cities could be well positioned to tap complementary federal support if the pilot scales. With copper prices recently flagged around $14,500/t and described as a 'structural squeeze', pilots in legacy Arizona districts such as Globe-Miami are strategically timed to monetise low-grade or stranded copper units that were uneconomic at earlier price regimes.