Top10 Tungsten Mine Projects Outside China Ⅶ: La Parrilla Tungsten Mine

The La Parrilla tungsten mine is located in southwestern Spain, in the province of Cáceres-Badajoz, about 310 kilometers southwest of Madrid. It is one of the top ten tungsten mine projects outside China. It is currently the largest tungsten-tin mine project in production in Spain.

W Resources (formerly known as Caspian Holdings) is developing the La Parrilla tungsten mine outside China and a tungsten tailings project in Spain. With JORC-compliant resources of 47Mt grading 0.09% WO₃, the project is one of the biggest tungsten deposits in the western world and is being developed in three stages.

The mine is expected to extract 2.5 million tonnes (Mt) of run-of-mine (ROM) ore a year while producing 2,500t/y of WO₃ concentrate. It is expected to have a mine life of more than 30 years. Construction on the tungsten mining project began in 2013 and the first production was achieved in September 2016.

According to the 2017 Ore Reserve Statement, the estimated resource of Laparila Tungsten Mine is 49 million tons, the average grade of tungsten trioxide is 0.10%, the resource of tungsten trioxide is 49,000 tons, the average grade of tin is 0.011%, and the tin resource is 5390 tons. The ore reserves are 29.7 million tons, the average grade of tungsten trioxide is 0.0931%, the reserve of tungsten trioxide is 27,650 tons, the average grade of tin is 0.0110%, and the tin reserve is 3267 tons. The mining life of the mine is 11 years, and the initial annual output is expected to be 2 million tons, which will rise to 3.5 million tons/year in 2020.

In December 2011, British Tungsten Resources (W Resources, WRES) acquired Spanish Iberian Resources for US$1 million, including the ownership of the La Parrilla tungsten mine tailings pond; at the end of August 2013, WRES acquired the La Parrilla open-pit tungsten ownership of the mine and subsequently obtained environmental permits and mining permits.

WRES hopes to make La Parrilla tungsten mine the largest tungsten tin mine project in Europe. It is planned to achieve an annual production capacity of 2,500 tons of 66% tungsten concentrate and 200 tons of tin concentrate by the end of 2017; in 2020, the goal of achieving an annual production capacity of 5,000 tons of 66% tungsten concentrate and 400 tons of tin concentrate.

It is understood that the La Parrilla Tungsten Mine project outside China was officially completed in September last year, and full-load production began at the end of November. The first batch of tungsten concentrate was sold in January this year. However, due to the Covid-19 epidemic, there is a decrease of 17% in the production capacity of the tungsten tin mine in the second quarter. While the tin production increased 65% month-on-month to 20 dry metric tons. In the first quarter of 2020, the mine's tungsten concentrate output was 3306 metric tons. Tin production was 12.1 dry metric tons.

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