ANTOFAGASTA RELEASES 2021 CLIMATE CHANGE REPORT
NEWS RELEASE, 16 DECEMBER 2021
Antofagasta releases 2021 Climate Change Report
Antofagasta (the "Company") today releases its 2021 Climate Change Report, highlighting how the Company is fulfilling the ambitions set out in its Climate Change Strategy. The Strategy, which was approved in November 2020, is designed to help the Company decarbonise and reach its net zero commitment by 2050, while increasing the resilience of the Company's operations and surrounding environments to climate change.
The Strategy is based on five key pillars:
1. developing climate change resilience,
2. reducing GHG emissions,
3. managing strategic resources,
4. managing the environment and biodiversity, and
5. integrating stakeholders.
Iv á n Arriagada, Antofagasta CEO commented: "Climate change is one of the greatest challenges facing society and our company today. As a copper producer, Antofagasta can address this challenge both by decarbonising its operations and by responsibly and sustainably providing a key commodity for the transition to a low-carbon economy.
"Our Climate Change Strategy is a dynamic strategy that we will be adapting in line with changing climate scenarios, regulation and scientific and technological advances, always with the aim of boosting the company's resilience and competitiveness. This is, we believe, the best way to fulfil our purpose of developing mining for a better future."
Climate Change Report Highlights
· Ambitious targets to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions: in line with Chile's national commitment, Antofagasta aims to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, or sooner. These targets also include a 30% reduction in Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 2025, compared to 2020.
· Addressing water scarcity: working to decrease continental water consumption by increasing the use of seawater in copper production from 43% today to 90% by 2025.
· Electromobility Plan: working to eliminate diesel entirely from the Company's operations, replacing it with cleaner fuel such as hydrogen.
· Strengthening climate resilience: adopting the recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), whilst also mitigating emerging climate risks and taking advantage of the opportunities to decarbonise our business.
· Leveraging every part of the Company: seeking to maximise engagement and horizontal collaboration across multidisciplinary areas and levels of the Company to drive better implementation, monitoring and continuous improvement.
Pillar 1: Developing Climate Change Resilience
· Building on the Company's climate scenario analysis, the Company has developed a model that assesses climate risks and opportunities across different future climate scenarios on an ongoing basis. The potential magnitude of Antofagasta's exposure is similar under both an extreme physical warming scenario and an aggressive mitigation scenario.
· The Company is in the process of finalising a Long-Term Energy and Carbon Reduction Plan and has introduced an internal carbon price to incentivise the allocation of capital to projects, which will decarbonise its operations. The internal carbon price has been used in the creation of the Company's 2022 budget and from January 2022, will be used in the economic evaluation of supply contracts.
Pillar 2: Reducing GHG Emissions
· In 2018, the Company set itself the target of reducing direct (Scope 1) and indirect (Scope 2) GHG by 300,000 tonnes of CO2e by 2022. As of end-2020, the Company had more than met this target, achieving a reduction of over 580,000 tonnes compared to the 2017 baseline.
· Therefore, in May 2021, the Company announced its aims to reduce Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 30% by 2025 compared to 2020, equivalent to a reduction of 730,000 tonnes of CO2e.
· To address Scope 1 emissions, principally the result of the use of diesel for mine haulage, the Company is:
o Partnering with the Hydra Consortium, to explore the use of hydrogen in mine haulage trucks, as a replacement for diesel.
o Testing the effectiveness of injecting a small amount of hydrogen into the diesel used by trucks to reduce emissions, expecting to reduce fuel consumption by about 5%.
· To address Scope 2 emissions, all of the Company's mining operations are switching from conventional sources of power supply - principally coal - to renewables by year end-2022.
· To address Scope 3 emissions, the Company has agreed to participate in evaluating the feasibility of HyEx, a project led by energy multinational Engie and a Chilean explosives company, Enaex, to produce green ammonia in northern Chile. This would, in turn, be used to make ammonium nitrate, which is used for blasting in the mining industry and could also potentially serve as fuel for trains and ships.
Pillar 3: Managing Strategic Resources
· The Company has created a new Strategic Resources area to provide centralised management of the Group's water and energy resources, which includes:
o The continued reduction of the Company's use of continental water in areas where water is scarce through initiatives such as the Los Pelambres desalination plant and the reverse osmosis drinking plant at Centinela.
o Transitioning the Company to a low-carbon or carbon-neutral energy supply by focusing on renewable energy sources at the operations.
Pillar 4: Managing the Environment and Biodiversity
· The Company is exploring and innovating in nature-based solutions for the capture of CO2, improvement of environmental management and protection and care for biodiversity, as well as addressing adaptation to both acute and chronic physical risks, corresponding to the different climate change scenarios projected by the Group.
· The Company has applied a Biodiversity Standard, which seeks to ensure a net zero loss of biodiversity and is aligned with the ICMM's (International Council on Mining and Metals) position statement on Mining and Protected Areas.
Pillar 5: Integrating Stakeholders
· The Company is engaging different stakeholders in the design and implementation of water management initiatives to ensure that they benefit the surrounding communities and territories.
· In terms of its supply chain, the Company is developing programmes that help suppliers reduce and mitigate their own GHG emissions. In addition, the Company has for the first time, has included ESG criteria in its decision-making model with regards to procurement.
· The Company is training employees and other stakeholders about climate change to increase awareness and provide continuous incentives to facilitate the Strategy's implementation and success.
Next steps
The Company is continuing to strengthen its Climate Change Strategy through a number of initiatives, including:
· The creation of an Energy Policy, in line with the requirements of Chile's new Energy Efficiency Law, a Water Policy and an updated Biodiversity Standard.
· The Company's 2021 Annual Report will disclose its performance against TCFD recommendations
· The Company is also increasing the coverage of its GHG emissions accounting to include a wider range of Scope 3 emissions categories so that further upstream and downstream drivers of emissions can be identified.
Measuring Progress
Progress on the Strategy's implementation is tracked through a dashboard, which shows the advance of each pillar in general, and of each area of action in particular, as well as details of the related initiatives, including the deliverables and persons responsible. In addition, renumeration arrangements are tied to the effective implementation of the Company's business strategy, including the Climate Change Strategy.
The report can be downloaded here .
Investors - London Media - London
Andrew Lindsay alindsay@antofagasta.co.uk Carole Cable antofagasta@brunswickgroup.com
Telephone +44 20 7808 0988 Telephone +44 20 7404 5959
Rosario Orchard rorchard@antofagasta.co.uk
Telephone +44 20 7808 0988
Media - Santiago
Pablo Orozco porozco@aminerals.cl
Carolina Pica cpica@aminerals.cl
Telephone +56 2 2798 7000
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