Carbon Emission Cost Accounting for High-Altitude Open-Pit Nonferrous Mines in Northwest China: A Case of Lithium and Lead-Zinc Mines in Hotan_Vol. 3 No. 4 (JMSD 2026)_Journal of Management and Social Development (ISSN: 3005-5741)

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Carbon Emission Cost Accounting for High-Altitude Open-Pit Nonferrous Mines in Northwest China: A Case of Lithium and Lead-Zinc Mines in Hotan

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.62517/jmsd.202612421

Author(s)

Jiaqi Guo*

Affiliation(s)

Xinjiang Polytechnic Institute, Hotan, China *Corresponding Author

Abstract

Since China announced its targets of peaking carbon emissions before 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2060, mining enterprises can no longer treat carbon accounting as optional. This is a practical problem for the lithium and lead-zinc mines now being developed in Hotan Prefecture, northwest China. The Dahongliutan spodumene lithium deposit and the Huoshaoyun lead-zinc deposit are located at 4,600–5,600 m, and at such elevations low air density and extreme cold raise fuel consumption above what the standard emission-factor method assumes. In this paper an altitude-corrected carbon emission cost accounting framework is proposed for open-pit nonferrous mines. The framework is built by coupling an emission-factor inventory modified by an elevation-dependent fuel correction coefficient with a cost model that covers monitoring and compliance expenditure, annualized abatement investment and the shadow cost of carbon. It is applied to two scenario-based cases. The first is a 1.2 Mt/a spodumene mine with an on-site concentrator at 4,800 m; the second is a 2.5 Mt/a lead-zinc mine at 5,600 m that relies on captive diesel power. The estimated annual emissions are about 108 kt CO2e for the lithium mine (84.5 kg/t ore; 3.96 t/t LCE) and 173.5 kt CO2e for the lead-zinc mine (67.2 kg/t ore; 0.24 t/t contained metal). Altitude is responsible for an extra 26–33% of mobile-fleet fuel emissions. When a shadow price of 70 CNY/t CO2 is used, the comprehensive carbon-related cost is roughly 16.3 million CNY/a (637 CNY/t LCE) for the lithium mine and 25.3 million CNY/a (36 CNY/t metal) for the lead-zinc mine, which is 1.5–2.4% of operating cost. The sensitivity analysis shows that the results depend mainly on the carbon price, the power-supply mix and the altitude coefficient. On this basis, recommendations are made concerning mine-site renewable energy, staged electrification of the fleet, MRV capacity building and accounting rules that take altitude into account.

Keywords

Carbon Peaking and Carbon Neutrality; Carbon Emission Cost Accounting; High-Altitude Open-Pit Mine; Shadow Carbon Price; Lithium; Lead-Zinc; Hotan; Northwest China

References

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