Source: Bloomberg                           Date: 06 August, 2010

Ivanhoe Mines Chairman Robert Friedland, developing the Oyu Tolgoi mine with Rio Tinto Group, has said copper will outperform gold because of Chinese demand and the nascent electric car industry. “We shall need more copper in the next 20 years than was mined in the last 110 years,” he told the Diggers and Dealers conference. “Those of us in the business don’t have any idea where this metal is going to come from.”

“China will always remain the future for miners,” Mr. Friedland, 59, said. “In the next 20 years the world needs 600 million tons of copper metal, absent the phenomenon of electric cars. Cars are going to be electric.” Copper is used in lithium batteries, which power electric cars, and construction, with China the biggest user. Construction accounts for a quarter of demand, according to the Copper Development Association, and builders are the biggest users in the U.S., the second-largest consumer of the metal.