Reviews of distribution and utilization technology of international low-grade copper ore deposits

China is a country with rich mineral resources and the demand of copper resources in China increased substantially with the rapid economy development. According to the statistics from customs, China’s copper import volume has reached to 70% of copper consumption. So Chinese government intent to promote the green mining industry, develop the copper extractive technique of low-grade and refractory ore and utilize tailings to improve the utilization rate of copper. According to the data from MRDS, MEG and InfoMine database, we analyzed the distribution, utilization, deposit types, exploitation technology and mineralization controlling factors of low-grade copper ore deposits. Several important mineral deposits were selected as typical case study. This work can provide some referential basis for utilization of low-grade copper ore.