Extraction / Mining Mapping
Ivanhoe Mines published on March 31, 2026 an updated independent technical report for the Kamoa-Kakula Copper Complex. The report revises downward the near-term production guidance: 290,000 to 330,000 tonnes of copper anodes for 2026, and 380,000 to 420,000 tonnes for 2027. This is a significant adjustment from the December 2025 guidance of 380,000 to 420,000 tonnes for 2026 and 500,000 to 540,000 tonnes for 2027. But the numbers alone do not capture what is happening at Kamoa-Kakula. What the March update describes is less a production cut than a structural recalibration of the mine after a year of forced adaptation.
The sequence starts in May 2025. On May 18, the Kakula underground mine experienced a seismic event that disrupted operations across approximately 30% of the Kakula resource. The eastern section of the mine flooded. Ivanhoe suspended underground activities, withdrew its 2025 production guidance of 520,000 to 580,000 tonnes, and launched a comprehensive geotechnical review. Mining resumed on the western side of Kakula on June 7, 2025. Dewatering of the eastern section began in September. The operation ended 2025 at 388,838 tonnes of copper in concentrate, within its revised guidance range.
The updated March 2026 technical report incorporates what the investigation revealed. New geotechnical parameters, including wider support pillars and revised mine sequencing, have been applied across the entire complex. A mature extraction zone in the old Kakula workings has been removed from both reserves and resources. A separate zone was reclassified from measured and indicated to inferred. The overall extraction ratio has been brought down to approximately 60% of the mineral resource. The updated mineral reserve stands at 466 million tonnes of ore at a grade of 2.82% copper, containing 13.1 million tonnes of copper. The indicated mineral resource, at 1.27 billion tonnes at 2.65% copper for roughly 34 million tonnes of contained copper, remains largely intact.
This is the disciplinary part of the exercise. After the seismic event, Ivanhoe brought in AMC Mining Consultants to prepare the updated report, and the mine plan was redesigned with what management has described as conservative parameters. The approach has a clear logic: anchor future guidance to what can be delivered safely rather than to what the deposit can theoretically yield. The 2026 and 2027 Kakula mine plan is refocused on developing long-term access infrastructure, ventilation, dewatering systems and electrical reticulation, ahead of returning to high-productivity stoping.
The production picture is therefore a transition profile, not a decline profile. Mining at the Kamoa area (Kamoa 1, Kansoko, Kahala) is expected to run at approximately 540,000 tonnes per month in Q2 2026, equivalent to 6.5 million tonnes per annum, at a grade of about 2.3% copper. As eastern Kakula zones are progressively brought back, higher-grade ore at 3.5 to 4.5% copper will re-enter the feed. The updated mine plan targets a ramp-up to over 500,000 tonnes of copper per annum from 2028, on combined Phase 1, 2 and 3 concentrator throughput of 17 million tonnes per annum, over an approximately 25-year life of mine.
Meanwhile, a parallel transformation has occurred downstream. On December 29, 2025, Kamoa-Kakula’s direct-to-blister copper smelter produced its first anodes. The facility has a nameplate capacity of 500,000 tonnes per annum of 99.7%-pure copper anode, making it the largest copper smelter on the continent. In Q1 2026, the smelter produced 63,671 tonnes of copper in anode. An additional 7,746 tonnes of copper in blister were produced at the Lualaba Copper Smelter in Kolwezi, bringing the quarterly total to 71,417 tonnes. By the end of Q1, the smelter was operating at approximately 60% of capacity. Ramp-up is expected to continue through 2026, with full capacity targeted by year-end.
The smelter changes the economics of the operation in two ways. First, it moves Kamoa-Kakula from exporting concentrate to selling a higher-value refined product. Second, it generates a by-product: high-strength sulphuric acid, averaging 1,350 tonnes per day, sold to oxide copper miners in the DRC Copperbelt at contract prices that have increased over 50% year-to-date. The operation does not consume sulphuric acid in its own process, which differentiates it from many producers in the region.
The logistics dimension matters as well. In Q1 2026, the first shipment of Kamoa-Kakula copper anodes was transported via the Lobito Railway Corridor to the port of Lobito in Angola, then shipped to the Aurubis refinery in Europe. Transit time from the DRC Copperbelt to the Atlantic coast averaged seven days by rail, compared to more than three weeks by truck to Durban or Dar es Salaam. This route reduces cost, shortens time to market, and opens a western export corridor that the complex did not previously use.
The revised cash cost guidance for 2026 is $2.60 to $3.00 per pound, decreasing to $2.10 to $2.50 per pound in 2027, with a medium-term target of approximately $2.00 per pound. These figures reflect the current transition phase. As Kakula’s high-grade zones re-enter production and the smelter reaches steady state, cost per pound should decline. At current copper prices, the margins remain substantial.
Looking further ahead, two expansion vectors remain open. The Phase 4 expansion scenario would add 6.5 million tonnes per annum of concentrator capacity. And the Western Forelands Exploration Project, covering 2,427 square kilometres adjacent to Kamoa-Kakula (roughly six times the complex’s footprint), continues to advance. The 2026 drilling programme is Ivanhoe’s largest to date, with more than 80,000 metres of diamond core and 16,000 metres of reverse circulation drilling planned. An updated mineral resource estimate for the Makoko District is expected in Q2 2026.
The structural question for investors and operators watching Kamoa-Kakula is not whether the deposit delivers. The geological endowment is established. The question is the speed and discipline of the ramp-back toward 500,000 tonnes and beyond, the smelter’s ability to reach full capacity on schedule, and the stability of the operating environment, both underground and institutional. The May 2025 event forced Ivanhoe to recalibrate not just a mine plan but the assumptions that underpinned it. The result is a more conservative but arguably more durable production trajectory for one of Africa’s most consequential mining assets.