In August 2018, Water. Desalination + reuse (Faversham House) reported that Canadian miner Teck Resources had obtained environmental approval for a desalination plant serving its Quebrada Blanca copper operation in the north of Chile. The Tarapacá regional Environmental Committee endorsed the impact assessment for phase two (QB2), with the formal resolution expected in September 2018. The developer, Compañía Minera Teck Quebrada Blanca, was 90% owned by Teck and 10% by the Chilean state. The project included a 140,000 tonnes-per-day concentrator, pipelines, a port and the desalination plant.
The report showed that large copper mines in Chile's arid north increasingly tied their expansion plans to desalination and dedicated water pipelines.