Amazon's Green Copper Gamble: Why 30,000 Tons Won't Power the AI Future
Amazon is paying a premium for Arizona copper that's pure enough to make you forget the Statue of Liberty's green patina—but it might not even cover one data center.
The tech giant has secured a two-year deal for the first new U.S.-mined copper in over a decade from Arizona's Johnson Camp mine. Rio Tinto claims the Nuton Technology process produces 99.99% pure copper cathode at the mine gate while eliminating traditional concentrators, smelters, and refineries.
This "mine-to-market" promise contrasts with the reality that only 14,000 metric tons of the 30,000-ton total will use the low-carbon method, with the remaining 16,000 tons produced via conventional leaching.
Amazon CCO Kara Hurst framed the deal as essential to fulfilling the Climate Pledge: "We're innovating across every part of our operations." Yet the 30,000-ton output pales against AWS's requirements, where each data center demands tens of thousands of tons of copper.
The Johnson Camp mine itself serves as a testbed for extracting low-grade deposits, not a scalable solution for the 70% more copper AI infrastructure will require by 2035.
