Azernews.Az

By Aynur Jafarova

Kazakhstan's aluminum (bauxite) resources are estimated at 809 million tons.

Bazarbay Nurabayev, chairman of the Geology and Subsoil Use Committee of Kazakh Industry and New Technologies Ministry, made the remark on March 18 at a meeting on the topic 'Status of the resource base of non-ferrous metals (copper, lead, zinc and aluminum), the ways of development of geological exploration works for nonferrous metals in Kazakhstan'.

He noted the major part of these resources is concentrated in the Torgai province.

During the period from 2003 to 2012 some 5-8 fields were under operation. In total around 47 million tons of bauxite was produced and about 4.7 million tons of this were produced in 2012.

Some 711,000 tons of growth was achieved in bauxite reserves as a result of geological exploration work carried out in 2008-2009 in the fields of East Torgai ore district. No growth was achieved during the period from 2010 to 2012.

During 2000-2013, investments in subsoil use of bauxite amounted to $ 1.3 billion and some $14.6 million of this amount was invested in geological exploration work.

Kazakhstan ranks second for reserves aluminum (bauxite) among the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) after Russia. Alongside with bauxite, nepheline syenite, alunite, andalusite and iron aluminide ores can also serve as raw material for producing aluminum. The country's industry processes only bauxite for the time being.

The entire industrial base of bauxite raw material is concentrated in the Northern Kazakhstan. Other regions of the country consist of mostly small fields and low-quality bauxite which currently do not have industrial value.