Abstract
Many exploited mineral deposits are at the final stage of development. The depletion of mineral reserves leads to a reduction in the volume of production and output, as well as to the social tension of single-industry towns, whose activities are directly dependent on the mining and processing industries of the economy. In our research, the initial data are the materials of geological observations and testing of tailings storages of the copper ore beneficiation factories of Kazakhstan. Studies on the composition and properties of tailings of the ore beneficiation factories indicate the prospects of processing them as a special type of technogenic ore raw materials. Special field geological and mineralogical work has been carried out at tailings storages and laboratory mineralogical and experimental technological studies of tailings. Huge reserves of technogenic ores have been accumulated in the preserved tailings storages, which have real prospects for expanding the mineral resource base and can be processed to obtain additional amounts of copper and other valuable related components. The research results can serve as a basis for further research on the choice of reagents and a rational scheme for processing technogenic ore raw materials for extracting metals from it.