- AWS demand dwarfs Arizona copper output despite renewed domestic mining activity
- Nuton technology shortens copper processing while leaving scale limitations unresolved
- Only part of the deal relies on Rio Tinto’s lower-carbon method
As global copper demand continues to rise, Amazon Web Services has agreed to source newly mined copper from Rio Tinto’s operations in Arizona, marking the first domestic copper supply in more than a decade.
The material will come primarily from the Johnson Camp mine, which has restarted as a proving ground for Rio Tinto’s Nuton bioleaching process.
The agreement links copper output directly to US data center construction, where demand has risen sharply due to expanding compute infrastructure.
Nuton technology and digital oversight
Each hyperscale facility requires very large copper volumes, which raises questions about how much impact a single mine can realistically have.
Nuton relies on naturally occurring microorganisms to extract…