Australian mining giant Rio Tinto has announced that, with new drilling results and ongoing assessment of assets, it has expanded the size of its mineral resources in Western Australia's Pilbara region by two billion mt, which will be in addition to currently reported 14.4 billion mt of mineral resources and 2.8 billion mt of ore reserves.
Rio Tinto's CE for iron ore and Australia, Sam Walsh, said the expanded resource base would help underpin the company's development of its Pilbara operations to an annual capacity of 333 million mt in 2015 and decades to follow.
Mr. Walsh said Rio Tinto had drilled 3.3 million meters in the past decade and plans to drill 3.9 million meters in the next five years, which is an unprecedented program in the history of the iron ore business, demonstrating the company's commitment to sustained development in the Pilbara.