Russia's blister copper smelter Karabashmed, which is controlled by the Russian Copper Co., will within days begin production by a new furnace supplied by Australia's Ausmelt, Russian Copper Co. said Thursday.

The new furnace will enable the smelter to increase its blister copper output to 90,000 metric tons a year from the current capacity of 42,000 tons a year, the company said.

The ore for the new smelting capacity will partly come from deposits mined by the company in the Urals.

Karabashmed will also commission by the end of this year a new concentrator for secondary processing of slag, whose output will partly satisfy the increased concentrate requirement.

Russian Copper Co. has invested $120 million in upgrading Karabashmed over the last 2.5 years. Bankruptcy