First Majestic Silver announced it achieved a 33% annual reduction in carbon footprint per ton of ore processed, which is the company’s lowest carbon footprint on record.
As released in its 2024 Sustainability Report, the silver and gold mining company announced a total reduction in its carbon footprint of 44% compared to the baseline set out in 2019.
“Sustainability and accountability are two of our core values at First Majestic,” said Keith Neumeyer, President and CEO of First Majestic, in a statement. “Last year we built on our long history of responsible management by further applying these values, publicly sharing with all stakeholders our commitments to excellence in eight sustainability topic areas. I am pleased to share that we have met our targets across all these areas.”
First Majestic uses various energy sources to power its operations with diesel, LNG, hydroelectric power and purchased electricity. While the company continues to partially rely on higher-carbon fuels such as diesel generation as backup for its continued operations, over the past several years First Majestic has shifted the energy mix to cleaner, less environmentally impactful options. When used for power generation, LNG has approximately 30% less carbon emissions than diesel.
At the San Dimas site, primary energy is supplied by a nearby hydroelectric plant, with generators on site to supply emergency and backup power. In 2024, San Dimas began a project to transition its emergency and backup power generation fuel from diesel to LNG, which is expected to be completed in 2025.
La Encantada transitioned to LNG power generation in 2016, and in 2022 Santa Elena completed its conversion to LNG as its primary source of fuel for power generation.
The company also implemented efficiencies in its processing operations, which has helped maintain relatively steady metals recovery despite increasingly complex mineralogy and has been completed without significantly increasing energy consumption. These actions have helped substantially reduce processing costs, energy costs and carbon emissions while maintaining silver and gold recoveries.