Anglo American chief technical officer Tom McCulley told mineral explorers in Vancouver on Monday that a faster, cleaner energy system will only be built if the mining industry can find and develop new deposits at pace, and with public trust.
“The world needs far more critical minerals, and it needs them faster, safer, and more sustainably,” McCulley said in a keynote address at the Association for Mineral Exploration’s AME Lunch.
McCulley, who oversees Anglo American’s technical fields, like discovery and geosciences, framed copper as the clearest illustration of the challenge facing miners and governments.
“In developed economies, there are about 230 kilograms of installed copper per person. Globally, that number is just 70 kilograms of installed copper per person,” McCulley said.
The 2-billion-tonne gap
If global living standards and electrification rise together, he said, the amount of copper embedded in buildings, vehicles and power networks will need to expand dramatically.
“If we’re serious about bridging that gap, global installed stocks must rise from around 500 million tonnes today to more than 2 billion tonnes in the coming decades,” McCulley said, adding that artificial intelligence data centres and grid expansion could push demand higher.
The supply side is tightening as ore grades decline and deposits become harder to reach, he said, a trend that has emerged alongside longer project timelines and higher costs.
“Reflect for a moment that global production of copper in the last 25 years alone exceeds all copper produced going back through human history,” McCulley said, arguing that the next wave of supply will be tougher to deliver than the last.
His remarks came as British Columbia steps up its push to attract mine investment and accelerate permitting. The province last week issued permits for Centerra Gold Inc. to expand the Mt. Milligan copper and gold mine near Fort St. James, extending operations to 2035 and supporting 574 jobs, with projected capital spending of up to $400 million.
On Monday, B.C. announced new fixed permitting timelines for mineral exploration beginning April 1, 2026, saying most exploration permits will be processed within 40 to 140 days depending on complexity, and committing $3 million to add capacity and support consultation processes.
The province said 2025 was a record year for exploration, with $751 million spent, up 36 per cent from 2024. It also said an escalation process will be used for delayed applications.
Technology vs. Trust
McCulley said technology can help compress discovery timelines and improve decisions, pointing to advances in airborne and ground based geophysics and machine learning tools that speed up core interpretation. He cautioned, however, that technical progress will not substitute for legitimacy in communities where projects are built.
“While technology can help us find and develop resources more efficiently, trust is what allows us to develop them at all,” McCulley said. “As powerful as technology is now and will be in the future, please remember it cannot replace the human relationships that make projects possible.”
The Anglo-Teck merger
McCulley noted Anglo American expects Vancouver to become home to the combined company’s global headquarters as it moves to merge with Teck Resources Ltd.
“We announced our merger with Teck last September to form Anglo Teck which will be a global critical minerals champion based right here in Vancouver,” he said.
Anglo American and Teck said in December they received federal approval under the Investment Canada Act for the transaction, and outlined commitments that include spending at least $4.5 billion in Canada within five years and at least $10 billion over 15 years.
The B.C. Chamber of Commerce has welcomed the merger, saying it will support jobs and strengthen the province’s mining sector.
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