Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Glencore 2021 Investor Update webcast and conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one on your telephone keypad. You can register your interest to ask a question at any point during the presentation. I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today, the 2nd December, 2021. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Martin Fewings, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you, operator. Good morning. Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us today for our 2021 investor update. Speaking today will be Gary Nagle, Glencore CEO, Steven Kalmin, CFO, and Peter Freyberg, Head of Assets. Without any further ado, I'll hand it over to Gary to lead off.
Good afternoon. Good morning to those dialing in from the United States and good evening to those dialing in from the Asian markets. Thank you very much for joining us here for our Investor Day presentation. As Martin mentioned, I'm here with Steve and Peter. Each will have a turn to present during today. We're very glad to present our investor update for 2021 in what has been so far a very good year for the business. Our investment case uniquely positions us for the future. How is it that we're gonna achieve that business case? It's broken up into four areas. One, we provide the commodity solutions that supports the journey to net zero.
How we do this is through production, recycling, sourcing, marketing, and distribution, which is absolutely unique and unique within our business, and it's not something any of our competitors can provide. The second leg is our asset portfolio, which is really focused on larger, high margin and longer life operations. Thirdly, our marketing business also includes a carbon and power strategy. These provide a carbon solution to the commodity supply chain. It's an absolute unique solution to our customers that no one else in our business can provide. Lastly, we are both commodity and geographically diverse. We produce, we market, and we recycle, all all leading to a very resilient and cash generative business. Our strategy is absolutely clear, and it's aligned to the future of a decarbonized world. We are Paris aligned to a 1.5-degree pathway.
We produce, we recycle, we market all the materials needed to decarbonize energy. We produce green metals, and at the same time, we focus on reducing our own environmental footprint. We also recognize that the energy transition certainly isn't linear through time, nor is it linear through geography. Therefore, our responsible decline of our coal portfolios certainly mirrors that. It ensures critical regional energy needs are met as the world decarbonizes. To explain our journey a little more and to achieve our carbon emission reduction commitments, we follow seven different pathways. First, we manage our operational footprints, and that's a focus on our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions.
Peter's gonna talk a little bit later about our MAC curve and the opportunities that we have and we've identified and that we're implementing within our business, which both lead to decarbonization within our business and in all cases are value accretive to our business as well. The second path is a reduction of our Scope 3 emissions, and we have a unique capability to reduce these Scope 3 emissions by responsibly running down our coal business. As you know, we've set a short-term target of 15% reduction of Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions by 2026, a 50% reduction by 2035, and a net zero ambition by 2050. This is a Paris-aligned 1.5-degree scenario commitment, and it is unique, as I said, within the industry.
The third pathway is prioritizing capital for our transition metals. Our investment is focused, our capital investment is focused on what we call the green metals, the future facing metals, copper, cobalt, nickel, and zinc. Most CapEx is directed towards these entities. CapEx that's committed to our energy portfolio is directed to ensure safe and efficient and ultimately well-rehabilitated operations as we run down the coal portfolio. The fourth pathway is a collaboration with our supply chains, and we work in partnership with our customers and supply chains to ensure greater use of low carbon metals. We have long-term supply arrangements for the likes of green aluminum, for cobalt, with partners like FREYR and Britishvolt. These are key in our drive to ensure our supply chain remains the leading decarbonized supply chain in the industry.
The fifth pathway is supporting the uptake of the integration of abatement. As we know, the IEA has said all technologies need to be used in its, in the drive to decarbonize the world, and one of those is abatement of carbon emissions in fossil fuels. With our partners in China, Huaneng, we are developing the CTSCo project in Australia, which is associated with the Millmerran Power Station, where we are building a pilot plant to capture carbon and sequestrate it. The sixth pathway is around a really large and growing part of our business, which is our recycling business. That feeds into the circular economy that we subscribe to in this company.
We are one of the world's largest recyclers of end-of-life electronics, batteries and battery metals, and it's a part of our business that is growing every day. The last pathway is taking a transparent approach. We report on our progress and we report on our performance, and we're very glad that 94% of our shareholders approved our climate change strategy we put to them at our AGM earlier this year. At Glencore, we are ready to supply the world's future needs for metals, which will help decarbonize the world. We have done significant work on a number of opportunities we have in our portfolio, and we are ready to action these. However, we will only action these portfolios at the absolute right time when the world absolutely needs this material.
Virtually all our projects are brownfield projects. They have access to existing infrastructure, and they are very high capital efficiency growth projects with very high margins that are needed in the metals needed in today's world for a decarbonized future. As we deliver our strategy, we're also going ahead and simplifying our portfolio. As you know, we've announced a number of disposals. We haven't announced each one of our disposals. Some of them don't meet that threshold, but we report today that we've disposed of seven different assets and we have 10 sale processes underway within our portfolio, and an additional 15 assets are under internal review, which may lead to sale processes for those assets. The overarching platform to all of this is our ethics and compliance program.
This year, we launched a refreshed code of conduct, which incorporates our values, and it guides us in how we do business every single day. This is something that I've led from the front, and the new management team are leading that with me. We have the gold standard in compliance programs in our compliance program, and encompasses all elements of a robust compliance program. It covers all areas such as assurance, training, real-time sanctions monitoring, elimination and reduction of agents within our business, full-time compliance officers around the world, an absolutely empowered compliance program, and a raising concerns line that is robust and followed up to the end of each concern raised. I believe this program is extremely robust. It promotes good business and ensures the success of our company. With that, I'll hand over to Peter.
Thanks, Gary. Just before we look at our outlook, I'd like to quickly touch on some key points from 2021. Our assets have largely performed in line with expectations, and although in general, we have learned how to operate effectively, notwithstanding the complexities brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been some impacts over the last couple of years, some of which have lingered into 2021. With regard to copper operations, our Katanga operation at DRC continues to perform well, very much in line with the excellent production we achieved last year. Some upsides still to be achieved, but I'm comfortable with how that team is progressing there. The balance of our copper portfolio has operated mostly within plan. Our zinc operations had a couple of features to note.
In 2021, we have started to feel the impact of some of the production reductions from mines which are approaching the end of lives. This is the case in Kazakhstan and Canada. Thus, there have been some ramp-up challenges with our Zhairem project relating to material handling at the front end of the plant concentrator. I recently spent some time there with the team, and work is progressing, and we expect to get to super capacity sometime in Q2 next year. When we talk about nickel, it's always of importance to talk about our focus asset, Koniambo. The overall nickel output is obviously contingent on that. As you'd be aware from the production report, we had a very difficult first three quarters. It has taken some time to recover from the very serious impact that COVID had on the site and plant in 2020.
Tremendous work has been done at the site since then, and over the last couple of months, we have seen the benefit of that work with markedly improved operating integrity and production. What is worth noting on this slide are the reductions to the portfolio, the reductions and additions to the portfolio. On the addition side, we've obviously got the two nickel projects, Raglan, Onaping Depth, plus Zhairem for zinc and Mutanda restart, for the copper cobalt department. On the reduction side, also please note the zinc closures, disposals, obviously Ernest Henry, that Gary spoke about just now, and as you'd be aware, three coal mines approaching their end of life. In terms of the outlook for the next four years, copper, as per the previous slide, you can see the effect next year of the Ernest Henry disposal.
Thus, there are some modest decline in units from non-copper departmental production, but generally flat. Cobalt, you're seeing some volume growth associated with Mutanda coming on and some further growth from the Katanga tons as well. Zinc profile reflects the Zhairem ramp-up, which is, however, offset by the disposal of the Bolivian assets and the closure of Matagami, Kidd, and Lady Loretta in the next three years. Our ferrochrome business is expected to continue to perform well. Good tons and some growth through improved performance on top of what has been a very good year this year. The step up in coal that you're seeing there mainly reflects us moving to 100% from our current 33% of Cerrejón, which is anticipated to happen mid first half next year.
I think bottom line, when you look at, you see that, in copper equivalent, we're actually showing around 10% growth into next year and then steady after that. A quick update on Mutanda. We are in the process of starting this operation up, and in fact, we did produce our first copper cathode in October. I visited the site recently, and it's in very good shape, and it comes through the care and maintenance period well, and we do see a 20-year life ahead of us. The first phase of that life of asset plan will be the oxide phase, where we are processing some of the existing stockpiles for the next two to three years while we open up some more oxide reserves in the pit. We are continuing with the sulfide studies.
The preferred way forward involves the addition of flotation using a Glencore technology IsaMill™, as well as Glencore technology Albion Process™. It's a relatively modest pro-project in terms of CapEx and highly capital efficient. The first few years of production are expected to run circa 25,000 to 30,000 tons of copper a year with just over 10,000 tons of cobalt. The average output over the life, obviously higher, averaging somewhere around mid-70,000 tons per annum and just over 20,000 tons of cobalt. Obviously, the ramp up, we are expecting to get the mining lease renewed to allow this prior to May next year. As Gary foreshadowed, we're gonna talk about our Scope 1 and 2 emissions.
As you'd all be aware, Glencore has articulated its ambition to be a net zero emission business, across its Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions by 2050. With that, we've also set some clear interim targets. As far as Scope 3 is concerned, which is the most significant part of our footprint, our diverse portfolio uniquely allows us to address this through investing in our metals portfolio while responsibly reducing our coal production. Today, what I would like to talk about is where we are from an operational footprint perspective. In other words, talk about our Scope 1 and 2 emissions and our plans for reducing them. The graphic that you can see represents our total 2019 baseline Scope 1 and 2, 29.2 million tons of CO2 equivalent emissions.
Our unique mix of commodities, combined with the geography that we operate in, puts us in very good position in terms of abatement opportunities. Just over 10 million tons of our Scope 1 and 2 comes from purchased electricity. There are growing opportunities for replacing fossil fuel-based electricity with renewable energy. By the nature of the changes in the generation profiles in the geographies we operate in, or even because fossil fuel energy is that expensive in some of our geographies where we're operating, it makes sense to replace that with renewables today. Changing from fossil-based electricity to renewables is one of our biggest opportunities, and we are acting on that globally. As far as diesel and fugitives are concerned, a very significant proportion of the 9 million tons of Scope 1 and 2 in those categories reduces as we responsibly wind down the coal business.
With regard to the balance of the diesel, we operate a very large number of fleets of mining equipment which have to be replaced over time. As the technologies become available and fleet renewals become due, we'll replace current fleets with low or zero-emission fleets. It is worth noting that reductants are harder to tackle. We did say, and have said in our carbon strategy, that reductions over time wouldn't be linear. Certainly, reductants are an area that still requires some work by the industry as a whole. In the meantime, we have plenty of opportunities, and we are acting on them. We are in something of a unique position with our portfolio as well as the basis where we operate, and our marginal abatement cost curve shows that.
Of note, we have over the last year doubled the number of potentially value-accretive abatement opportunities identified across our industrial assets, and the nature of these opportunities places us on track for achieving our 2026 15% emissions reduction target. The opportunities shown are at various stages of development. We are advancing a number of them. By way of example, these include power purchase agreements in Latin America and Europe, energy efficiency and renewable projects in South Africa. Our investment into Inga Hydro project in DRC was completed this year. Our Onaping Depth projects utilizing battery electric vehicles is progressing into the equipment selection stage. Lastly, on this, given the nature of our abatement opportunities, we do not see a massive capital spend required to achieve this footprint reduction.
We all know and understand that as the world moves towards net zero emissions, that to achieve these reductions globally, that carbon prices will manifest in various forms. It's important to understand the resilience of our portfolio to carbon prices and increasing, ever-increasing carbon prices at that. What we can see on the slide here representing the total cash cost increase for different carbon prices on the respective cost quartiles for copper, zinc, nickel, and seaborne thermal coal globally for global production. This is not just Glencore. This is the global industrial, these are global industrial cost curves. The bottom line here is that if your assets or our assets are on the lower part of the cost curve, and if they are relatively low in carbon intensity compared to the competitors, then there is an advantage, and that will manifest in the form of a margin expansion.
The majority of our production is in fact in the bottom end of the respective cost curves, and generally very well-positioned in terms of carbon intensity. Our portfolio is very robust in a world of increasing carbon prices. It is important that we talk about our safety performance. There has been a significant reduction in incident rates over the last two years across our assets. Nevertheless, we still have, unfortunately, had three fatalities across our operations this year. We all know, my team knows, that any fatality is unacceptable and that all fatalities can be prevented. We continue to drive for a fatal and incident-free workplace. To achieve this, there have been significant changes in our approach to safety, including structural and people changes where necessary.
We have articulated a very clear set of standards for the business and rolled these out, and their implementation and effectiveness are being supported through sound management systems, including rigorous assurance processes. We are definitely heading in the right direction, albeit there is still more work to be done. Thank you.
Thanks, Peter. If we can just move to page 19, I'll look at some of the financial slides to eventually then hand back over to Gary. Some of these charts and slides you'll be very familiar with in our regular updates around capital and cost and volume within the business, projecting an illustrative spot-free cash flow generation. If we look at page 19, we'll touch on many of these points later on in the slides, but I think the key highlights around capital structure and maybe where there has been a progression in our thoughts. We've had that $10 billion- $16 billion range historically as being a tolerance range or where we'd like to target within the business. We would look to, in the ordinary course of the business, run at the lower end of that range at the $10 billion.
In fact, we see that as a steady-state cap within the business of $10 billion, around which, but also not looking to delever the business. I'll talk through some of the thinking and processes later on. It's now at the point that we would wish to maintain the business effectively around that $10 billion, generate the cash below it, pay out the base distribution, make that predictable, sustainable, and secure, and then look to periodically reload and top up the business back to $10 billion, using a selection of buybacks and cash distributions that we'll use. We haven't abandoned a $16 billion ceiling, if you like, because I think it would be both inappropriate, inflexible, and hamstringing the business to say we're not going to.
That there isn't some short-term tolerance to potentially accommodate some sort of M&A flexibility in the business for the right transaction at the right time with, of course, feeling confident to come and communicate and sell if such was a prospect. There is nothing at all cooking in terms of anything over there, but it's a capital structure flexibility that if there was something, we wouldn't want to hamstrung the business. It's we'd still be comfortable to be able to move towards the top end of that range and then quickly accelerate back towards $10 billion, which is where we see the cruising speed.
The $10 billion was always the $16 billion was always sized around being able to ensure through the cycle less than 2x leveraged through net debt EBITDA, where we stress test the business, whether it's $15 billion first half of last year through COVID initial shocks. This business has never been on a mark-to-market basis below around $8 billion of EBITDA and below $2 billion- $3 billion of free cash flow generation during those periods. That's where the 16 mathematically is sort of a 2x 8, and it's there to accommodate. We would look now at having obviously been around $10 billion, the businesses generate cash flow. We'd expect to clearly report net debt below $10 billion. As we report full year results in February last year.
Then we look to manage the business around continuing to generate cash and reload as and when appropriate back up to $16 billion. That's the adjustment, if you like, around where we see those two anchors around the $10 billion -$16 billion. Within the business reinvestment and general portfolio acquisitions, divestments, Gary's spent time at the beginning just looking at how we're critically reviewing and analyzing what fits in the portfolio, what might be non-core, where to take us future. There would be some optimization generally in the portfolio through those potential divestments and through that capital structure and distribution philosophy that would effectively anything below $10 billion would be returned to shareholders in the ordinary course of business.
If we just go over to page 20, maybe just a graphic of where the $10 billion -$16 billion . We see optimal leverage at that $10 billion with managing net debt around that level and periodically returning the cash flow to shareholders as we generate cash below that $10 billion . The $16 billion there is, as I said, a theoretical ceiling that's been sized around never putting the business if we were ever to be there, even in some sort of shock or stress scenario, the business would still be able to quickly work its way back towards 10 and not be sort of in breach or getting near that less than 2x levered. Obviously very comfortable at the moment running the business at less than 1x. We're on a pro forma basis.
If you look at the cash flow and EBITDA that we're generating later on, we'd be substantially less than 0.5x. You can see the big progress we've made in strongly repositioning the balance sheet and cash flow generation during the last 18 months as we've worked it down to below $10 billion during this particular period. Just spending a bit of time on CapEx. This year we would. We announced 12 months ago, a target or an expectation around $5 billion. You would have seen through our half-year reporting, we were, run rate was, pointing towards a potential, underspend around that $5 billion. We think now we'll come in at $4.5 billion. We're not seeing that as a windfall permanently necessarily.
It's a shift or a timing of lag of that cash flow towards 2022, a bit into 2023. I think it's important looking at the CapEx around the aggregate of the 2021, 2022, 2023 years, where last year we were averaging $4.7 billion around those three years combined. We're now at $4.8 billion. Net-net, that can be completely explained in taking on Cerrejón, which we've assumed to complete during the middle of the first half of next year, which would bring in around $0.1 million or $100 million per annum from its close in terms of its capital position while we run that business over the next 10 years.
We've seen somewhat offsetting effects of a bit of inflation which has come through to some higher energy freight and some producer currencies early in the period. That was a headwind. Currency is now increasingly actually providing tailwind in terms of the strength of the dollar, and we're seeing the benefits of that both in CapEx and in OpEx, and we'll look at some of the OpEx later on. CapEx going forward, average now $22 billion-$24 billion. Rolling that forward, we're looking at a $4.8 billion average $5.3 biilion-$4.7 billion-$4.4 billion, mostly within the metals area. We've got expansion $3.9 billion per annum, $2.7 billion sustaining and a $1.2 billion combined per annum around the energy portfolio.
Predominantly coal, we also have a little bit of oil in there, both upstream, which will also decline consistent with our commitments on decarbonization and a bit going into the Astron business, of course, down in South Africa. That general CapEx profile over the years as we responsibly manage a declined coal portfolio, you'll see some commensurate reduction in the CapEx of that business also going forward. The bigger expansion projects, Peter mentioned those, they'll have the consequential eventual capacity and volume benefits down the track. That's in the Collahuasi desalination, a big project with our partners Anglo American there. We've got 44% there. That's a cumulative $750 million assumed over this three-year period, 2022-2024. The INO, the nickel projects Canada, also into the refinery in Norway.
There are also substantial projects, the biggest of which is Raglan and Onaping Depth. Scope 1 and 2 emissions is not a large factor over and above our normal CapEx projections that we do have. We expect these to be funded via our normal stay in business life of asset plans. It's gonna be through fleet renewals. They may move towards lower carbon electrification as it goes forward. There may be through the Scope 2 general sourcing of power. We may have to, over time, take some take or pays or some other contributions towards those, but they'll all be done within a very accretive NPV as evidenced by our development of our various methods. If we move on to page 22.
We've tried to put a thought process flowchart, but effectively, and I'll sum it up and potentially work through some of those. We've got the base distribution. It's been well articulated and understood as to how that operates. It will reflect the fixed element, the $1 billion in respect of the marketing business, which is less correlated to commodity prices and forms an anchored cash flow generation of the business itself, as throughout the various cycles that we've been through in the last, in the last decade or so. We've also got 25% then of the industrial free cash flows, which for us is the EBITDA, less CapEx tax interest and any distributions to minorities that we do have.
That'll be declared and at our full year results each year in respect of the previous year's cash flows and paid out 50/50 in two installments around the May and September period of each year. Now of course, we're having a decent 2021, as you'd all be aware, so we expect a very healthy declaration of our base dividend in February 2022. The various top-up returns linked to the previous page where I've said we've got this managing around effectively a net debt capital of $10 billion.
The concept would be to generate the cash through our normal free cash flow generation, have our declaration of the base dividend occur in the ordinary course of business, and then use opportunities both in our full year results and the half year results to top up potentially that distribution and move back up to the $10 billion. The key part of the thought process is not to declare or borrow or spend money in expectation of future cash generation. We wanna generate the cash, have it sitting in the account as part of our reported numbers, and then look to periodically reload, if you like, back towards the $10 billion. I think that is a more conservative profile.
Shareholders from our discussions over the years would be supportive of that. It de-risks the balance sheet and it makes at least the base distribution also more sustainable, more predictable and defensible going forward as well. Just looking at the left-hand side of that sort of potential flowchart, and it's really just to say if we were to have come into reporting net debt in a particular year in February, if it happens to be above $10 billion, the only explanation for why that might have been is that we had previously done an M&A transaction that had taken us above that we had the flexibility to do that. We'd be working our way back to $10 billion.
We would still be. That wouldn't come at the expense of the base distribution, which we would declare and pay out. The base distribution becomes sacrosanct. That will be paid and declared each year. We'll then, even if we report net debt below $10 billion, if we're below $10 billion and the declaration of that base dividend itself would take us back up to $10 billion, of course we pause, wait for the future cash generation to come through the H1. Of course, if we're well below the $10 billion, let's say we're at $5 billion in February or a particular period, the base distribution is $3 billion, we would immediately top it up $2 billion at that particular point, which would be within the $10 billion. The same really applies at the half year results.
It's the same thinking. We would have those two periods to periodically look to top back up to 10 based on actual cash flow that's been generated and have it as a sort of a rolling cycle if we look at it both at a full and a half year particular period. If we then go into our various cost bases, I think there's been a good delivery, a good progression, a good management of those businesses, notwithstanding areas of cost pressure, areas of supply chain, areas of general industry inflation through a variety of operational factors.
This is the start of where we're clearly moving towards our update of our annualized spot free cash flow generation, which I'll give later on, and looking at some of the production volumes that Peter had updated back in slide 12. Copper itself is very robust. It's moving towards $0.45 a pound all-in cash cost for 2022. The higher cobalt volumes is a material factor for them, both in prices, which is holding up well. We've got our pricing FX macros that we've used, which articulate on page 38. We've got 37% extra volumes in cobalt from 35% to 48%. Pricing is also healthier. To a lesser extent, we do have that shift in the Mount Isa copper business, both the mine, the smelter, and the Townsville refining operations.
Those have now been transferred recently into the zinc business for the management of an overall Queensland Metals integrated polymetallic project, where we can harness efficiencies across that business and look to develop the most optimized long-term plan for the Queensland Metals business as well. There's been, and of course, the Ernest Henry operation as well, which moves outside of the copper stable from effectively January 2022. The copper business you'll see later on at spot prices is as a cash flow generation of an EBITDA of about $8 billion. Zinc itself continues to be in the negatives, primarily due to the extensive by-product volumes and credits that we get across the primary zinc.
There's a lot, there's big volumes in the gold, silver, and lead, and now increasingly a bit more in copper due to the Mount Isa complex which has come in. They're at -17%. The biggest contributor there on a by-product is the gold out of the Kazzinc business. You can see we've highlighted the pre- and post-gold on the zinc business. The nickel side of the business, not the largest in terms of EBITDA contributor to the business. Overall important commodity in terms of demand profile going forward and one we focused on clearly in some of the Canadian project, but also to return and deliver Koniambo tons in a sustainable cash positive margin going forward. We are seeing some cost pressure on by-product side out of the INO business in Canada.
As existing mines move towards end of life, we will have the two big projects come on in 2023, 2024, and some of those trends, both in the economies of scale and some by-products, are expected to stabilize and reverse that trend. The coal business on the bottom, on the bottom right is all a little bit bunched together now, both in cost and margins, which are all in the sort of low fifties. Currently the business, this is based on the 120 million or so tons, are picking up the extra 2/3 of Cerrejón assumed to occur sometime in the middle of first half next year. Will be costs around $53.5 a ton at a margin of $52.
We'll look at how that's been brought up later on, and that'll deliver $6.3 billion of EBITDA, the coal business, on a conservative Newcastle forward curve, which we use as we have done in the past into those. If we go onto page 24, that's just the high level derivation at spot prices. These are all primary price macros taken in the last few days. Of course, markets are up and down, so this can change from one day, one week to the next. But we provide all the details on page 28. It's arguably a better slide even to look at with more details of $21.7 billion to $10.8 billion. So maybe I will focus on slide 28.
You can see the copper business, which is the 1.15 that Peter mentioned earlier on. We do have copper from the other departments, and then we show the net price post a 4% payability across the overall business. A cost of $0.45 a pound, you're at $7.9 billion copper EBITDA. Zinc similarly just under $3 billion, nickel $1.2 billion. The coal business at $6.3 billion. That's a relevant headline. Newcastle of around $132. That's an average of the 2022 forward curve. Spot is closer to around $150, and it does move towards about $120 to a month's time. We've taken an average, as we've done in the past, to try to be conservative around there.
We've got the thermal average cost of $53.50. What Cerrejón effectively does, and it's very NPV and cash flow accretive to the business as well, but it's lower margin. I mean, it's lower cost, but it's also a higher discount to a headline Newcastle, given markets and quality and the like. It will have the effect of increasing an overall portfolio mix, which looks to account for all the variations in quality, in commitments, in timing, in different markets getting down to effective realization for across all our tons, which is 121 million tons. On that same page, you can see footnote nine. For 2021, we're expecting the coal industrial EBITDA to be around $5.3 to $5.5 billion, basis the current macro projections that we have. Well.
Now, if you recall, for the first half of 2021, our coal business was only $0.9 billion. That would equate to about $4.5 billion for H2, annualizing at $9 billion. We've obviously seen very strong prices through H2 have moderated somewhat in the last month or two, but $6.3 billion of EBITDA, we'll take that. In terms of taxes and interest and other $5.5 billion, we have assumed or factored in some potential interest rate rises over this period. It's not the most material, but we have assumed 50 basis points potential increase through the course of 2022. If that doesn't come to bear, well, it's obviously gonna be less.
On the CapEx side, $5.3 billion, that's somewhat punitive to 2022 as such, because as we've said, we've shifted some CapEx that would have been spent in 2021 into 2022. In the absence of that lag between 2021 and 2022, we might have had less CapEx in 2022 and an illustrative cash flow above 10.8 in the $11 billion plus or so. That's where we are on spot cash flow. Very, very healthy cash flow generation within the business, sustainable. We've used just the marketing middle of the range, $2.7 billion EBIT with $300 of depreciation. Of course, we've delivered comfortably above that the last two years, and the marketing business has in fact been above our 2.2-3.2 range.
We'll, of course, see our 2022, but we always at this time of the year, we'd look to just anchor around middle of the range. With that, I'll hand back to Gary just to conclude on the presentation.
Thanks, Steve. I mean, on that bright note, I think to sum up our business, we have the right strategy. We clearly have a sector-leading climate strategy. It's the only one that incorporates Scope 1, 2, and 3, culminating in a net zero ambition by 2050, as well as short to medium term targets, which are both, the medium target being Paris-aligned of 50% reduction in all three scopes by 2035. We have unique capabilities throughout the commodity supply chain that supports the decarbonization through all areas of our business, which is the production side, the recycling side, which is absolutely unique, and our marketing business, which complements the recycling and the production side of our business.
Given the trajectory that the world is on and the requirements of energy needs in today's world, we responsibly meet those energy needs today as we responsibly run down our coal business. When we look at our business model, it's certainly responsive and flexible, and we have a portfolio of larger scale, longer life, and low carbon advantage commodities, which is what the world needs as we drive forward into a decarbonized world. Steve pointed out the numbers. We are highly cash generative and have a very strong balance sheet, and that allows us to provide sustainable and growing returns in the transition to a low carbon economy. With that, I'd like to turn it over back to the operator and for questions.
Yes, sir. Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. As a reminder, for those who want to ask a question, please press star and one on your telephone keypad and wait for your name to be announced. Once again, star and one if you wish to ask a question. We have questions that came through. We will now take the first question, and it comes from the line of Liam Fitzpatrick. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, everyone. First question on the sales processes that you mentioned upfront. You say there's 10 assets which are under a sales process. I know you don't want to identify individual assets, but can you give us a ballpark figure of how much you could realize from asset sales over the next one to two years? Then linked to that, is the Agri business included within those 10 assets? If not, can you give us an update just in terms of latest thoughts on the strategy and potential to exit there? Then a final one, just to understand the shareholder returns. You're clearly saying that sub-$10 billion, that's all coming back to shareholders.
When we get to February, in terms of that formula that you're showing us, do you just add back the base dividend that will be paid in the first half, or do you add back the full year dividend, when you're comparing that against that $10 billion threshold? Thank you.
Thanks, Liam. I'll answer the first couple questions. On the value of the sale assets, I don't want to really give a value of what we're targeting or what we think we'll get yet because this is not about value. Clearly, we're at a good part in the cycle to be selling these assets, these so-called tail assets. The cash we realize will either be diverted back into some of the projects that we have in terms of our green metals or will fit into Steve's cash flow models in terms of returns back to shareholders, whether by way of buybacks or by dividends.
It's not that we're targeting a certain value, and we're not selling things in a fire sale. We're looking to create best value for us, but very difficult, or probably not appropriate to put targets out there in terms of values and cash flow or sales prices of the assets. With respect to Viterra, as we've mentioned before and we continue doing at the moment, we're working very closely with our partners. We believe there's a value unlock for Viterra. We've been communicating this for some time to the market, and we're working very closely with our partners to unlock that value. There are a number of opportunities to do that, and we need to be very careful and selective how we do it.
We continue to go down that road, and we will report back to the market as we find something or to the extent that we find something that allows us to create that value and kick that back for shareholders.
Liam, just in terms, I mean, you said, is Viterra in it? Now, yes, it's in, not as a sales process, but it is as an asset, if you like, under review. It might be in sort of between one of the two categories in terms of that sort of value unlock and how best for Glencore to get that appreciated and monetized in some way, shape, or form. It doesn't necessarily have to be a sale.
It just needs to be something that has a marker out there that you guys can say, "Bang, this is a sense for these things, and we can bring some more tangible." We are expecting some cash dividends for the first time to also flow between now and the end of the year, which also marks the sort of start of something that's clearly tangible, has a reasonable yield, and that business has continued to have a very good 2021 as it did in 2020 as well. I think your point around the distribution policy, we would need to take the full year because the timing of 50/50 is just it's less consequential.
Once it's a commitment, it's a commitment. We know we're going to spend that out, so we would account for it. By the same token, we obviously could account for any announced sales or transactions. Of course, we announced the Ernest Henry deal a couple months ago. We expect those to close in January. That cash will be, although not in by 31st of December, we can take that into account because it would have been cashed by the time we report the February results. We're just not looking to borrow for distributions and find that the cash and how we've accounted for it sort of ultimately is not as we would have necessarily expected. We don't want to be in a position.
As I said, I want to be able to, if I'm reporting net debt every single day, I don't want to be reporting net debt above $10 billion.
Okay. That's clear. Just as a very quick follow-up, will you stick rigidly to this new sort of formula? Because at the half-year point in August, you were close to $10 billion, but you were slightly above, but we still got a small buyback and a special. Going forward, we should just use this formula in terms of how we think about the dividends.
Yes, correct. We were still working within the range. We were starting to, if you like, sort of internally and externally think about putting in a sort of a harder cap also for people to think about the sort of capital structure, the metrics, sustainability and predictability and scenarios that one's been through cycles, obviously, in this business, and we don't want there ever to be any sort of doubt as to the predictability and the security of the base distribution that is and will be sacrosanct.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Jason Fairclough. Your line is now open. Please go ahead and ask your question.
Good afternoon, guys. Thanks a lot for the presentation. Two quick ones from me, I guess. First, just looking at slide seven, which is our old friend, the bubble chart. It's a bit of a bull market chart. If we look out three or five years from now, I guess my question would be, how many of these projects would you expect to be in execution? And is the CapEx for those projects in the guidance that you've given? That's the first question. Second question, and I guess for Steve, I'm looking at slide 20. If I understand the slide correctly, it seems that you're suggesting net debt at year-end of around $10 billion. I'm getting investors' emails from a couple investors who expected this to be lower, maybe even lower than $8 billion.
I guess any color you could provide around that would be helpful.
Hi, Jason. Thanks. I mean, to answer your question, I'm not trying to be evasive, but in three to five years, the answer is we don't know. The reason we don't know is because we will only bring these into the markets when we see that the market needs the tons. Right now, the markets look good. We do not want to bring on tons that will oversupply markets. In three to five years, we still see a very strong bullish market. Quite difficult to read that far out. When you look at things like the growth in electric vehicle demand, when you look at the decarbonization drive and the growth in things like transmission lines and the likes, things look very good.
We continue to take these assets along the value curve to a position of comfort for us and we know we can execute. We won't say we're gonna bring them on until we absolutely clear the market needs those tons and not oversupply market. When we come to our CapEx forecasts, no, they're not in our CapEx forecasts, but likewise they're also not in our tons forecasts and our earnings forecasts. We haven't put any of that in. We are taking these up the value curve. We're taking them up the confidence curve, and when we see the market is ready for them, we'll bring them in. The fact is our cupboard is full. It's certainly not bare.
It's full of projects, brownfield projects, brownfield expansions in the commodities that we need, and we will action those as and when we think that the market needs them.
Okay, thank you.
Jason, on your second point, slide 20, if that wasn't clear or certainly clear from my comments, we'll be comfortably through $10 billion by the end of the year.
Okay. Yep. Thanks a lot, Steve. Appreciate it.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Ian Rossouw. Your line's now open. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Just a couple of questions from me. First of all, just would be great if you can provide a bit more details on these asset processes, not necessarily the individual assets, but just what are the criteria you look at? I mean, you mentioned on the slide talking about longer life, lower cost assets that sort of helps you to moving towards the energy transition. Was curious just from a geographical perspective or other sort of ESG risks, just what are the various things that you look at? And also from a conditions perspective, I mean, what decisions do you make to keep the assets versus selling them?
Hi, Ian. Thanks. The way we look at each asset, each asset gets looked at individually, and the ones that sit on that list are effectively will be there for a number of reasons. They either could be subscale, they could take up a disproportionate amount of management time. They may not provide the return on equity or the return on investment that we require under our capital allocation framework. They may no longer be fit for purpose in today's Glencore. Ten years ago, they may have been very fit for purpose. We need to move with the times and understand what our business looks like and assess the assets in that framework. Of course, some of them may be some ESG risk. They may...
Whether it be the commodity that it's in, or the geography that it's in, or the conditions of the operation or whatever it may be. So really it's not a one-size-fits-all approach. Each asset is looked at on its own merits with how it contributes to the portfolio, with how it contributes to our business model, with how it contributes to our strategy. With that, we then make a decision whether it sits on that list of something to be reviewed or where we start a process or we keep it within our business.
What's the likely timeframe for the sales processes and also the internal review? I mean, what do you have in mind for that?
We're working on these all the time, and they're front and center for the management team. At the same time, it's not a fire sale. We'll work through these and make sure we exit the ones that make sense to be exited in the right way to responsible buyers, in a responsible manner. We're not gonna put a timetable out there, only you know that it is a priority of management and we are working on these.
Thanks. Maybe just one more follow-up on Jason's question on slide seven. What would you consider, Steve, as a sort of maximum CapEx figure in terms of your capability to spend on expansionary projects? Just to get a sense of if you, down the line, start to look at some of these projects, I mean, what would we see as a sort of maximum level CapEx?
No, thanks, Ian. I mean, none of these are mind-blowingly sort of high single. I mean, there's obviously many are hundreds of millions. There'd be a few in low single digit billions based on where they are in their different stages. They're all showing under even conservative certain assumptions, these are ones that progressively show healthier returns. That's why they're getting progressed already through all the stage gate processes and the likes. All would, to varying degrees, take multi years to spend that capital. So even something sort of hypothetically, let's say something was a well sort of, I don't know, call it $1.5 billion in one of them, and it was three years of spend, it might be $500 million.
By then we would've been through all, pretty much all of our current expansion, which is running at sort of $1.2 billion-$1.3 billion. As we showed earlier on in our sort of CapEx slide, you very quickly move into the low $3s for a genuine sustaining capital within this business. Coal obviously declining over time. I find it hard to see situations where we couldn't do all these things and see CapEx per annum for any sustainable period of time being materially above $5 billion a year. I think we can work within the $5 billion per annum capability and be having that as a sort of an annual amount.
There's a lot of headroom within $5 billion to accommodate pretty much the full suite of projects here.
Okay. Great. That's great. Thank you very much.
Yes. Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Alain Gabriel. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Thank you. I have a couple of questions. The first one is on the copper production profile, which appears to have declined slightly versus the previous guidance, even after adjusting for scope. Do you mind elaborating a bit more on the drivers of that change or that decline? Thank you. That's the first question.
Certainly. We've obviously got Ernest Henry coming out, but we have lost some copper at our non-copper operations. As we start slowing down in northern Canada at Matagami and Kidd and those sorts of operations, we do see some tons come out. There is a declining profile at Mount Isa as well over time. Although Katanga is steady state, we've got a pickup coming from Mutanda, some of our non-copper dependent assets start losing some production.
Alain, I'm not sure. I mean, last year we showed, I don't know which years we're obviously looking at, but if we're looking at last year, we were showing 23 at 1,210, we're now 1,180. Ernest Henry sort of can take out 45, 50 or so. We've got sort of MUMI, Mutanda in at 25, 30 sort of during those periods. I think the difference you're talking about is probably 10,000-15,000 tons maximum around the rest of the portfolio. I think Antamina goes sort of up and down over a few grades.
There's a decrease next year.
It picks up again.
It picks right up again. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, copper of all businesses also relative to last year, but for Ernest Henry and bringing in Mutanda, I would say is the most consistent profile of all that we would have had from last year.
Thank you. My second question is back to the portfolio optimization and, back to Liam's question as well. What is the ultimate objective of these accelerated drives to sell assets? Clearly, the point in the cycle that you mentioned is one goal. But I guess, is it also to upgrade the quality of your portfolio to reduce capital intensity or a mix of all three? How should we think about the ultimate or the overarching theme behind this accelerated drive to sell these assets?
No, Alain, I think this is something, a process we've been on for some time, and as I've said, it's part about simplification. It's part about assessing what is fit for purpose in our business right now. We have certain assets in our business which perhaps are subscale. Now, they weren't subscale 10, 15 years ago. They were very fit for purpose 10, 15 years ago and contributed to the creation of what we are today. So they were key assets. As we've grown, developed longer life assets, tier one assets, lower cost assets, some of these perhaps are no longer fit for purpose within what we look like today. That's the drive behind it.
It's about ensuring management time is focused on the right assets, the right jurisdictions and the right commodities. Those that perhaps are not fit for purpose anymore, a bit subscale are the ones that we're looking to move out of the portfolio.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Jack O'Brien. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon. Thank you for the presentation today. Just wanna start on your balance sheet flexibility point. You mentioned the upper end of the $16 billion allowing you flexibility and also that, you know, as it stands today, there's nothing cooking there. But just to you know, theoretically down the line, could you perhaps give an indication of which sort of commodities or opportunities you'd be most interested to buy into, whether that's sort of profile or size in light of, you know, all of those opportunities organically through that bubble chart and also yeah, others in the portfolio? That's the first question.
Yeah, thanks, Jack. I mean, I think it would be fair to say that probably consistent with most of the rest of the industry, it's looking towards some of these sort of commodities of the future that have these demand structural improvements, the green revolution, everything that we're going. I mean, that's clearly where everyone's focused, frankly, is. It doesn't mean that they may be the best opportunities necessarily there as well. One needs to be careful. That's the consensus play. It would be in our interest to stick to our knitting as well. You're gonna see us within the commodities where we're and the businesses, both from a marketing, industrial, commodity sphere where we're strong, have obviously existing businesses.
We have both the vertically integrated model of value throughout the supply chain. It could be in all these metals that we're obviously talking about as well, whether it's in sort of the copper, cobalt, zinc, nickel type businesses as well. It could be in aluminum as well. That's another commodity that, in terms of the right structure over there. It's a variety of things that you would expect us to for the right opportunity and the right constructs, but it's not something that, as I mentioned earlier on, nothing really cooking. There is a limit of what can be done at the moment.
It's hard to necessarily buy assets at that value that would make sense for us necessarily at the moment. It's also why potentially an opportunity to sell some of those non-core assets and why we see, certainly with what we've announced at the moment, I think, we're quite happy with some of those numbers and the value that's been realized.
Got it. Understood. And just a brief follow-up on a couple of your operating assets. I think starting with Mutanda, you'd previously communicated hope to get back to perhaps copper production around 90,000 by 2025. Just t rying to understand if anything's changed there. I think you pulled out 70K during the presentation as a figure. Secondly, just on zinc, it looks like the production guide there has changed somewhat. I appreciate one or two of the moving parts, but perhaps you just the latest update on Zhairem ramp there would be helpful.
Okay. On Mutanda, we've obviously done the work, and we feel that it's right size for where it is at the moment in terms of the returns that we're getting. Obviously, the plant facilities have had historically greater capacity, but this is the sweet spot for us in terms of how to operate it right now, processing some stockpiles that are there and then obviously opening up the pit to get to what is remaining in the oxide ores and then building up the sulfide business at the appropriate time. This is using the existing capital fleet, which is still in good condition, using the existing plant and maximize returns for Glencore on that basis. In terms of Zhairem, it does have a capacity of 5 million tons mill feed a year.
We'll be running it close to two this year, and ramping it up into the second half of next year. I spent a few days out there a couple of weeks ago with the team. The plant, it's a great plant. The front end has had some challenges with some of the weathered materials that we've had to put through to start the pits off. But that stabilizes fundamentally on sulfides next year and should steady out, hitting that 5 million ton pace sort of mid-year. It's a good resource, low strip ratio, decent grades, and certainly over the next four to five years, we'll be averaging 150-175 thousand tons of zinc per annum. It's a good business.
Got it. Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Myles Allsop. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you. Just I guess over the last week or so, you've had this, activist agitating to split the coal and the base metal business. I mean, how are you thinking about that and how are you kind of assessing whether that would create value?
Myles, hi. You know, we believe our business model is robust and it's strong, and it's the right business model. We've articulated a coal strategy. We believe the rundown strategy is the responsible strategy for both our business and for the world. We put it to our shareholders at the AGM. It got a 94% approval at the AGM, and we're confident that our strategy is the right one.
Okay. There's no thinking twice about it at this point. Just with-
We've always made it clear that, you know, if the majority of our shareholders, our large shareholders, the majority of our shareholders say to us that they want us to spin off our coal assets, then we must listen to what the majority of our shareholders say. We've had 94% of them say they like our strategy, which is to responsibly run down the coal business, 50% reduction by 2035 and then an ambition of net zero by 2050. That's what they've said. Now, if they change their mind that these large shareholders, the majority of them say to us they have a different view and they think spinning off the coal assets is the right way to go, then we need to consider it.
It's their capital that we're employing in this business. For the moment, that's what they've told us, and we believe it's the right strategy, as do they, as shown at the AGM vote.
Right. Could you give us a quick update on Prodeco? And, you know, do you think that that coal mine could ever restart?
Not while it's within the Glencore portfolio. We have committed to return those leases to the Colombian government, and we're in that process at the moment.
Maybe one very last question on Mutanda. Could you accelerate the restart? I mean, obviously if the political situation in the DRC is attractive, copper price, cobalt price, super attractive, is it possible to bring forward the full ramp up or maybe even go back to the 200,000 tons that it used to produce? How much optionality is in that asset?
There's a fair amount of optionality, but we're obviously very conscious of the total amount of cobalt that we're producing as well. We want to make sure that we're managing that responsibly and not cannibalizing our own business by going too hard at that asset.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Christian Georges. Your line is now open. Please go ahead. Christian, your line is now open. You may go ahead and ask your question.
Yes, sorry. Thank you for your time today, gentlemen. Two questions from me, both looking outside Glencore. The first on the coal market conditions in China. We've seen a record shortage on thermal coal, and you know, the increase in production. DRC now suggesting that there may be a glut of thermal coal in the Q1 next year because of all the coal they are managing to produce. Do you believe that may be the case?
Well, certainly the Chinese have increased thermal coal production significantly within China. One of the reasons why we saw such a spike in prices because of reduction in Chinese production that was led largely because of some safety crackdowns. We saw them curtailing power, and there's been a significant move now to increase production, and production is strong in China. However, with that said, the seaborne coal market that we operate in still remains very tight. We see Newcastle prices at $155 a ton, Richards Bay about $130 a ton. There are still supply-demand fundamentals in the seaborne market that dictate a very strong market. India has strong demand.
We've seen significant rains, for example, in Australia, 2 million tons of exports out of the market just in the last 10 days. South African rain problems. The supply-demand balance still looks very good in the prompt. What happens three-six months forward, and how the Chinese produce and what they do? Well, that's anyone's guess right now. For the moment, the market looks relatively balanced from a supply-demand perspective on it, from a seaborne perspective.
Quite. You know, for next year, if the Chinese imports, which are running at, I don't know, 250 million tons per year, if those were to come down, say, 100 million, there would be a lot of tonnage which would have to be reallocated somewhere else on the seaborne.
No, you're absolutely right. Look, the Chinese always have some, they have this unstated cap of around 200 million tons of imports, and they like to use those imports to stabilize the domestic market. Now, this year, because of the production cuts in China, they had to go through that stated cap of 200 million tons, and that's why, as you rightly say, they're importing close to 250 million. If they had to reduce it by 100 million, of course, there'd be an oversupply in the seaborne market. But at the same time, they also want their coal mines in China to be profitable. They can't run them at losses. They need to run at decent margins. If the coal price in China collapses, they're gonna have a problem with the coal mines.
They use that import and legislation to ensure Chinese coal production is still profitable at the same time. To see whether there would be a 100 million ton collapse in or a 100 million ton reduction in imports? Hard to see that. You don't know what happens in China. Very difficult to read China. We believe that Chinese imports certainly will be down on what they are this year, but we don't believe they'll be down as much as a 100 million tons.
Okay, great. Very clear. My second question is on copper and aluminum, 'cause you were mentioning earlier in your explanation that green aluminum is something which is obviously gaining traction and so on. To the case that perhaps green aluminum would have a premium to aluminum these days. Now, does this potentially apply to copper? Do you see a future where copper would have the same kind of issue with its Scope 1 to 3, you know, environment, and then we can get a premium on green copper? Will that be something which would be favorable to you?
Look, I mean, of course, aluminum creates this. It has this green aluminum premium, and we see a premium in today's market simply because of the amount of power used to produce aluminum and amount of dirty power in many cases. In some cases, you have 18 tons of carbon per ton of aluminum. In some cases, it's four. There clearly is a bifurcated market in terms of green aluminum, and you do see premiums for that. Now, the carbon intensity of copper production is less than the carbon intensity for the production of aluminum. There is, you still have, for example, our operations in the DRC, hydro-powered production using SX/EW technology. That is much lower carbon, close to zero carbon production of copper versus your traditional coal-fired smelter for copper.
There certainly is an opportunity to see a two-tiered market in copper as well, where you see the green copper attracting a premium over dirty copper.
Okay, great. Very clear. Thank you very much.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Sylvain Brunet. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Hi, good afternoon. This is Sylvain from BNP Exane. Two quick modeling questions. First on Mutanda. If you could remind us of the CapEx and how much was included in 2022. The second modeling question is on the coal indications. Steve, you gave around the $5.3 billion-$5.5 billion EBITDA. Wondering how much retroactive contribution is there from the 2/3 contribution from Cerrejón. If we could start with these two, and I have some follow-ups.
Yeah. In terms of Mutanda, given what we've just shaped into the near term, is the oxide treatment of stockpiles and some mining for that. The capital is very low in the next sort of three or four years. I think $40 million or something cumulative. The bigger capital is obviously gonna come in the sulfide phase, which, as Peter said, can be accelerated subject to market conditions and planning around that. That we put a number of $250 million, which would be spread and spent over a few years later on.
That would be more than covered by the extra cash flow that would be expected to be generated at the time with those volumes of both copper and cobalt. Whatever is there, it's not much, but it's reflected in the CapEx numbers that I gave before. The second question is very easy. On the $5.355, what's in for this year is nothing, because we haven't closed that transaction. There will be cash flow EBITDA only from completion of that transaction, expected middle of first half next year, but we have enjoyed t he economic benefits of any cash flow that has been accruing since 1 January this year via eventual adjustments to purchase price or the net cash position that will be inherited when we do take over. None of the extra 2/3, it's only 1/3 of Cerrejón in those numbers.
Very good. Following up on DRC, and from a strategy standpoint, is there any possibility that Glencore could consider more downstream producing of, for instance, battery precursors at the time? It's pretty clear through this energy transition that vertical integration is gonna be core and center, and that the world is entirely dependent from China. So is battery precursor production something that Glencore could ever consider? Talking about DRC, how would you compare the competitiveness of building costs in the country where compared to other mining geographies, given how cheap land and labor and construction tends to be?
In terms of beneficiation, the DRC, certainly we would look at further beneficiation to the extent that it adds value both to us and to the country. There are some ideas around conversion of hydroxide to metal within the DRC, and that's preliminary work, and it's something that we're working closely with the government and would continue to investigate if it made sense both for the operations and for the DRC government.
In terms of building costs there are some lower cost aspects to it, which are obviously labor and the like, and there's some higher cost aspects which relate to the logistics of bringing materials in, often over thousands of kilometers of road haul. Generally, the value of the resources there carries whatever the construction cost is and can provide a good return.
Excellent. My very last one. LFP batteries, which have made some inroads in China, doesn't seem to be so popular in other geographies. Is your read the same that it is likely to remain more of a Chinese product?
You know, there will be a market for those. We know that the sort of cobalt-containing batteries are the ones for the long range, more stable cars. There's a demand for those cars. We know where the demand is. We see exponential growth in the demand for those type of electric vehicles. At the same time, there's a separate market where you're looking for these short-range, smaller type vehicles that just run around like a taxi in China, for example, that runs around during the day and doesn't need these long ranges and doesn't need the stability. We see exponential growth in both those markets.
Our modeling really focuses more on the cobalt-containing batteries, which looks like a very strong market for the foreseeable future.
Well, I think the world's gonna need all sort of forms of applications and chemistry to deliver the sort of rates of penetration and decarbonization that one would sort of hope for in terms of meeting some of these carbon objectives. It's all hands on deck here, and we certainly think cobalt's in for a very good long-term demand period.
Great. Thanks so much.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Dominic O'Kane. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. I've just got two quick questions. First one on cost inflation. Again, you covered it in the presentation, but maybe if we could just sort of dig into any specific areas and commodities where cost inflation is a broader concern than others. In that context, over the last month, we've seen you be forced to curtail some of your zinc refining capacity in Europe. Are there any other smelting, refining or other activities worldwide where cost of power is an issue for your capacity? The second question is on commodity trading. Obviously your long-term commodity trading guidance has been quite stable at the 2.2-3.2 for a long time.
Is there anything you're seeing structurally in the commodity trading market or the changes in the composition of your business that perhaps means that that's a conservative estimate now long term?
On cost inflation, we are. I think it would be naive to think that some of these high commodity prices won't work their way through, and certainly whether it's oil or steel or copper, it will manifest to some extent in some of our consumables. There are some signs of it, but nothing untoward at this stage. However, you did touch on the refinery in Europe. Some of our power is hedged and we're under control as far as that's concerned, but we are exposed in some of our facilities to the market. Where that happens, we manage it sort of on an hour-to-hour, day-to-day basis. When you see power sort of hitting EUR 300 per megawatt hour, obviously that has an impact.
Where necessary, we will curtail operations, but generally, we're in control at this stage. There's no doubt that this is having an impact, but then that will flow through to metal prices as well, which is quite interesting.
Yeah. No, I think Dominic, on the trading part, you said we've got the range 2.2-3.2. I mean, we've been through sort of two years of outsized volatility, outsized sort of supply chain issues, tightness in certain commodities, very extensive monetary policies and what that's also driving. So it's certainly been a trader's market, there's no doubt about it, within the last two years. That's been evidenced by us being at 3.3 last year and saying we're gonna be sort of above the top end of our range again this year. But I think it would be naive to think that that's gonna be necessarily forever.
It would be nice if those sort of conditions and arbitrage and volatility and the likes was there for us to provide the sort of conditions that would lead us more towards the top end. We've always said, I think there were times we were at 2.3s and 2.4s, and the questions used to come every year, "When are you gonna be at the top end, and what are the sort of conditions?" Now we've had two years there.
Let's see a few more years potentially entrenching here as to whether we think there is some sort of structural element that's crept into how the world is sort of run with less headroom, less capacity, maybe more geopolitics, more people reverting into their own sort of entrenchments and supply chains, how that all plays out. It's been two good years. Let's see how the next few years. We have expanded obviously in certain product areas and in power, carbon, LNG.
Cobalt's obviously been very good, but you would think over time, maybe on the energy side, coal, oil, as those markets on the liquid side, reach a peak and there is potential demand declines, you may need some of these extra areas to sort of compensate for the energy transition and decarbonization. We're comfortable with that range long term. There's probably a bias to an upgrade, given the last couple of years, but we're not quite there yet.
Could I just ask one quick follow-up. On coal sustaining CapEx, you put a number for energy around about $1.2 billion. Should we consider that to be a relatively stable number over time or steadily declining?
It will steadily decline. That's not just coal, by the way. We've obviously.
Yeah
Got, there's still sort of quite a bit of Astron in that, both in the refinery and some of the downstream. They're above average on some of that period. We would still have some oil fields across our different between Equatorial Guinea Cameroon. That's also consistent, gonna have a declining profile over time. Coal would make up the biggest share of that 1.2. But you'll find when we're at 50%, it will be heavily correlated, of course, to the pathway and decline towards that sort of down 15% in 2026, 50% by 2035, and obviously even further reductions beyond that. It's not. Yeah, it's gonna come down.
I mean, over time, we'll plot the production, CapEx. You'll have fewer and fewer assets and complexes. Already, we've shuttered three of the operations and mines within Australia in the next two or three years that we'll be reaching end of life and moving to rehabilitation modes.
Thank you.
Yes. Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Tyler Broda. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Great. Thanks. Thanks for the call today. Two quick questions, and then one will sort of build upon. In terms of, and apologies if you've given this number already, Steve, but do you have an estimate at all of how much you've raised in terms of asset sales, so far to this point?
Yeah, I mean, we've obviously announced anything that's material financially. Of course, Ernest Henry was announced, you know, that's AUD 1 billion. The Kemmerer U.S. terminals, that was $242 that we announced at our production report. The other ones, sort of Bolivia was sort of upfront $20 with some earn-outs that we put at sort of $110. I think we gave as a full expected value on those assets. The other ones, some terminals that we've put on page 8 are obviously relatively small. I mean, the one that is in the sort of market knowledge, which is a process underway, is Cobar, of course, as well.
There's some numbers floating around on what people think that asset may or may not be worth, but that's obviously gonna be a reasonable check and reasonable size. Some of the others are smaller things. Some of these sort of a Turkish LPG terminal and a downstream oil business in Nigeria probably wasn't on too many radar screens on this call. There was probably $25 million-$30 million between those, some of those. That was all part of what would have been a higher asset base. We're now at sort of $75 million across the portfolio.
Some continued pruning around the asset base will generate value and money that both has that we're getting the right structure and proceeds for these assets, either through the strength of the counterparty and through the monetization. These are things we're obviously focused on. Some are small. The biggest one, of course, to date was Ernest Henry and a few more, obviously Cobar would be the other one that's visible.
No, that's helpful. I just wanna make sure the other ones, no materiality or anything there. In terms of the guidance from Steve, you produce about 10 million tons a year of coking coal. Obviously coking coal up at $307 a ton. Were there any adjustments made to that, to the Newcastle price for that? Or is that sort of having ignored the coking coal price at this point? Just 'cause obviously quite a big delta.
Yeah, the coking coal we treat like we do in zinc and copper, where we have by-products. Coking coal is effectively treated as a by-product of all the tons. If we treat the full 120 as overall tons, it then is all built into that portfolio adjustment to get down to a net realization based on the spot markets of the day to deliver an overall coal business EBITDA. So the stronger the coking coal prices, it'll shrink. It'll make that portfolio adjustment smaller because you'll get a higher overall realization. The lower those prices are, of course you will expand those, and it'll just get balanced out with all the other quality and regional adjustments that we do make.
It's just a byproduct in that 53 in the 26 number of the 130 Newcastle that we put at the moment.
Okay. Thanks for that. I guess just a more high-level question. I mean, historically, Glencore has, you know, added a lot of value over time, you know, through M&A. Company built obviously on that basis. I mean, how do you see, Gary, the best way now to add long-term value? Like, are you too big to grow? Is marketing still a differentiation factor big enough to be able to help drive acquisitions? I guess philosophically with sort of the aversion towards greenfields, how do you sorta think on a long-term basis you can best add value?
No, we can certainly add value in all facets of our business. We're not just a single producer of material but on that side, on the mining side, we can certainly grow. As Steve says, there's nothing cooking on the M&A front, but it doesn't mean that we're not aware of what's happening in the market and open to considering opportunities when they come up. We would look at M&A opportunities if they came up. However, if we did that, it would be in line and in accordance with our very strict capital allocation framework. It would have to meet the thresholds we have, which cover many different facets.
Not only the returns on investments, but whether it be the right commodity, whether it be the right geography, whether it be the right ESG credentials. M&A is certainly one way of growing, but nothing on the table at the moment. The other way is our brownfield expansions. We talked about that in our presentation, and we have a number of really world-class opportunities to expand our existing businesses where we have access to existing infrastructure, expansions of existing businesses, and that's a big area of growth. As I said earlier, we're not going to do any of those unless the market really needs it. We're in a very fortunate position that the cupboard is very full.
We have a number of opportunities in all the right commodities, and we'll pull the trigger on those when the opportunity is right. With that said, we've got other strings in our bow. Our marketing division is absolutely critical within our business, and it's growing. As Steve said, we've come up at the top end of, or above the top end of our guidance two years in a row. It's a business that continues to evolve. We've incorporated a carbon and a power element into that now. It gives us the ability to provide customers with a full solution, not just providing them with a product, but we can provide them with a carbon-free product, a decarbonized product, a product delivered to a certain location and which is also carbon free in terms of the freight, whatever it may be.
It's a growing business, and it's a complementary business to our industrial side, and our industrial side is a complementary business to our marketing side. They absolutely go hand in hand, and each one levers off the other and provides significant value to us, which is in fact a differentiating factor of our business versus many of our competitors. Then the last part of our business, which is a growing and exciting part of our business, is our recycling business, which feeds into the circular economy. We're a very large processor of end-of-life batteries and end-of-life electronics. We have partnerships with the likes of Britishvolt, with FREYR. Our Horne Smelter in North America is a big part of that business, and we have a number of ideas and plans and partnerships to grow that part of the business.
When you put those three together, it becomes absolutely unique in terms of our growth options as opposed to just being a simple, one-trick pony.
Yeah. There you go. Very, very helpful, Gary. Thanks. Thanks for the color. Appreciate it.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Jason Fairclough. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks, guys. Maybe just a bit of a big picture question as we get close to the end of this. You're winding down production at a lot of your coal assets. I'm just wondering if you can give us any kind of a feel for the resource that you're ultimately stranding, right? I realize that some of this would likely need further investment to be mined, but it would be interesting to sort of have a feel for what your productions mean in terms of actually leaving carbon in the ground and therefore avoiding CO2 emissions.
Look, Jason, it's difficult to be precise. I mean, we do publish our reserve and resource estimates. You know, the idea of this is not to produce all those resource, reserves and resources and be responsible and run down this business. You know, not all resources get converted into reserves, as you know, and not all reserves get mined, as you know. But we do have a significant resource base, as we disclose, and there will be a significant saving on carbon footprint as we run down this business and close and rehabilitate those mines responsibly. Now, if those were in the hands of somebody else, I'm sure they would be produced, but we don't believe that's the right strategy.
The right strategy is to keep it and run it down responsibly rather than leaving it to somebody who may not be in the public market, may be pro-coal, may want to exploit every ton in the ground. We don't believe that's the way to go, and we believe our strategy is the right strategy.
Okay. Sure. Thanks, Gary.
Thank you. No further questions have came through. I would now like to hand back the call over to Gary Nagle. Please go ahead, sir.
Just to thank everybody for joining us on the call. We have a very strong and robust business model. As I explained, we cover the production side, we cover the marketing side, we cover the recycling side. We have a very strong balance sheet, cash flow payout moving towards 100% as we break through our $10 billion net debt, which bodes well for shareholder returns both in terms of buybacks and cash dividends. On the ESG side, working very closely on the safety side. Peter making good progress. We're still not there.
We've got a lot of work to do, but we are seeing some green shoots in the programs that Peter is rolling out, and we continue to see improvement, and we'll continue to improve in that, on that front. Our compliance program, I certainly believe, is best in class, and our code of conduct and our values drives the way we run this business and will continue to take us to high levels in terms of the way we do business in our company. We're very well set up for the future, and we look forward to providing the returns to our shareholders. I'd like to thank everybody for joining today. Peter, Steve, Martin are available for follow-up questions by email if you need. Thanks very much to everybody.
Thank you. That concludes our conference for today. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect.