China maps copper-gold body, plans deeper drilling

At the Chating mining area in Xuancheng, Anhui Province, drill crews have pushed into a deposit that keeps going. After more than 70 drilling operations in four months, China’s Ministry of Natural Resources says the Shangchang village ore body extends about 1.2 kilometers long and 1.1 kilometers wide. One hole encountered mineralization exceeding 1,370 meters in thickness.

The campaign has not closed the geological story. One exploration hole extended beyond 2,000 meters, and the team plans a 3,000-meter scientific drilling project to examine the mineralization system and deeper resources beneath the continental volcanic basin. Lin Bin, the exploration site’s technical lead and deputy laboratory director at the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, said the work had clarified the deposit’s deeper and surrounding potential.

The ministry describes the copper resources as equivalent to several large copper mines and the gold resources as exceeding those of 10 large gold mines; its comparison uses 500,000 tons of copper and 20 tons of gold per large mine. Silver and sulfur are also present and could be recovered alongside copper and gold.

And what does that change in practice? A developed Chating resource could place raw materials closer to the Yangtze River Delta’s copper smelters, cable manufacturers and new-energy industries. The region has limited locally sourced copper and gold, with much of its copper concentrate arriving from western China or overseas, adding transport costs and exposing supply chains to international market and geopolitical disruptions.

The exploration also tests an old geological assumption: that extensive volcanic basins were unlikely to contain large porphyry copper-gold deposits. The team says volcanic basins around Xuancheng and Nanling in Anhui, and Lishui and Liyang in Jiangsu, could deserve further investigation. Those next steps remain planned exploration, not proof that comparable deposits will be found.