Zijin Mining nears 1,500 electric mine trucks as it plans to ditch diesel
Zijin says electric trucks cost about 29% less than diesel ones per metric ton-kilometer at its mines in China.
Zijin Mining (紫金矿业), a Fujian-based group that runs copper and gold mines in China and abroad, is replacing diesel haul trucks with battery-electric ones, and a unit of its own builds some of them. By the end of September, the group had put a cumulative 1,468 electric mining trucks into use, it said in its third-quarter report.
That compares with 1,314 trucks Zijin reported in its interim report in August, a figure it said was up 76.9% from a year earlier. Electric-truck coverage at its open-pit projects in China reached 55% by the end of September, the third-quarter report said.
Its third-quarter report said Zijin was accepting higher capital spending now for lower costs over the long term. Zijin said in a July news release that electric trucks cost about 29% less than diesel ones per metric ton-kilometer at its mines in China, by its accounts. It plans to replace all its diesel trucks with what it calls new-energy trucks within three years.
A Zijin unit, Zijin Longking (紫金龙净), delivered 15 battery trucks that each carry 140 metric tons (about 154 US tons) in the first half of 2026, and rolled out a 230-metric-ton model, the interim report said. Zijin says the 140-metric-ton trucks work at its Zijinshan mine in Fujian province and its Julong copper mine in Tibet.
Some of Zijin's electric trucks also drive themselves. EACON (易控智驾), a maker of self-driving systems, which counts Zijin as an investor, said in October that 60 battery trucks with its system run fully driverless at Julong's Zhibula copper mine, more than 5,400 meters (more than 17,700 feet) up. The drivers moved to a dispatch room, away from the cold, oxygen-thin pit, EACON says. Zijin's reports give no group-wide count of driverless trucks.
Driverless haulage reaches beyond Zijin. EACON, whose systems drive coal-hauling trucks at Chinese mines, says driverless mining is spreading from coal to metal mines and from China abroad, based on more than 3,800 trucks it has fitted at more than 40 mines.
Sources: 紫金矿业 Zijin Mining (2026 Q3 report, HKEX), 紫金矿业 Zijin Mining (2026 interim report, HKEX), 紫金矿业 Zijin Mining (news release) [1], [2], 易控智驾 EACON (newsroom), 紫金龙净 Zijin Longking (new-energy mining equipment page)
Editor: Ian Lamont
