Production

This section describes the main world resources of platinum group metals.

The six metals of the platinum group (pgm) occur in nature in close association with one another and with nickel and copper. They are among the least abundant of the Earth's elements. Of the few known deposits, those in South Africa and Russia are by far the largest. There are fewer than ten significant pgm mining companies in the world.

Platinum and palladium have the greatest economic importance and are found in the largest quantities. The other four pgm - rhodium, ruthenium, iridium and osmium - are produced only as co-products of platinum and palladium.

    • South AfricaSouth Africa
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      South Africa is the largest producer of platinum.  The Bushveld Compex began production in 1925 producing platinum as its main product with palladium and rhodium being the by-products.

    • RussiaRussia
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      Russia is the second largest producer of platinum.  The Noril'sk site in Siberia began production in 1935 producing copper and nickel as the main product with palladium and platinum being the by-products.

    • North AmericaNorth America
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      The Stillwater mine in Montana, USA, began producing pgm, mostly palladium, in 1987, whilst in Canada production of pgm began around 1908 when Inco began mining nickel with mainly palladium as a by-product.

    • ZimbabweZimbabwe
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      The presence of platinum, along with nickel and copper, were found in the rocks of the Great Dyke in 1918. It was not until 1996, however, that the geology of the deposits were understood and production could begin in earnest.

    • Resources in South AfricaResources in South Africa
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      In 1999, Professor Grant Cawthorn, the Platinum Industry’s Professor of Igneous Petrology at the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa, published a new estimate of the platinum and palladium resources of the Bushveld Igneous Complex.