Iran’s mining industry is preparing to cross a significant engineering threshold, as Chadormalu Mining and Industrial Company moves towards underground extraction of iron ore deposits located more than 300 meters below the surface.
According to the company’s chief executive Farid Dehghani, Chadormalu intends to pursue contracts involving deposits designated T1 and T2 and begin operations during the second half of the Iranian calendar year 1405.
The significance is that the project brings together geological exploration, underground excavation, specialized machinery and engineering coordination in an industry central to Iran’s manufacturing ambitions.
For Chadormalu, the immediate objective is securing future ore supplies, but for Iran’s wider industrial economy, the development offers an opportunity to apply accumulated technical capabilities to increasingly complex mineral extraction.
Iran’s geological foundations are substantial, encompassing iron ore, copper, zinc, lead and other minerals distributed across a territory with considerable geological diversity.
A 2023 report citing national statistics described approximately 12,000 mines nationwide, including 6,861 active operations, illustrating the breadth of the existing extractive sector.
These figures demonstrate the extent of Iran’s existing mining activity, providing the national industrial context for Chadormalu’s next phase of development.
Mineral abundance alone, however, does not determine industrial strength; geological knowledge, extraction technology, processing capacity and reliable equipment ultimately determine how much of that endowment becomes commercially useful.
Iran’s steel industry illustrates this distinction particularly clearly, having developed a large production base that depends on coordinated supplies of iron ore, concentrate, pellets, energy and specialized industrial equipment.
The World Steel Association reported that Iran produced approximately 32 million tonnes of crude steel in 2025, ranking tenth among global producers, despite continuing restrictions on international commercial and financial relationships.
That output represents more than an impressive industrial statistic, because every tonne requires an interconnected system of mineral extraction, beneficiation, ironmaking, steelmaking, maintenance and logistical coordination.
Iran also produced an estimated 37.2 million tonnes of direct reduced iron in 2025, according to figures attributed to the World Steel Association and reported by the Bureau of International Recycling.
Direct reduction converts prepared iron ore into metallic iron without the conventional blast-furnace route, making ore quality, processing expertise and dependable upstream production especially important.
These industries provide the economic context for Chadormalu’s decision, since the challenge is increasingly not simply locating mineral deposits but developing the technical means to exploit them and maintain industrial output.
As established deposits evolve and companies investigate deeper resources, the ability to extend extraction into more demanding geological settings becomes an increasingly important part of sustaining the wider production chain.
Moving underground requires a different engineering system from conventional open-pit extraction, bringing together access development, excavation, ground support, ventilation, material handling and specialized operational planning.
Iranian engineering firms have already demonstrated relevant capabilities in mechanized excavation, providing a tangible starting point for assessing the country’s potential contribution.
In 2023, Shayan Fanavaran Amitis, a knowledge-based company based at Tehran’s Pardis Technology Park, developed an Iranian roadheader for mechanized tunneling and underground excavation.
The company’s chief executive said then that the machine could perform continuous excavation, loading and transportation functions, with applications including tunnels and underground mining projects.
According to the report, the equipment had been used in projects involving the Pardis wastewater transfer system, a Tehran underpass, Angouran lead-and-zinc mine and Sarcheshmeh copper mine.
This example documents an actual domestic engineering product with reported field applications, rather than an aspiration to manufacture equipment that remains dependent on future research.
It demonstrates that mechanized underground excavation is already within the experience of at least one Iranian manufacturer.
A second example comes from Sangan-Khorasan Steel Mining Industries Company, which has reported progress in manufacturing equipment and components previously obtained from international suppliers.
By December 2024, the company reported localizing 90 equipment items and 2,275 parts, preparing more than 7,300 technical documents and achieving cumulative foreign-exchange savings valued at €14 million.
Among its more specialized projects was the domestic development of a seven-axis liner handler, machinery used in maintaining grinding mills, which the company said previously cost approximately €2.5 million when imported.
Sangan’s account attributes the development to cooperation between its engineering department and a domestic company, with research, engineering and construction completed within six months.
These examples reveal how Iranian industrial firms are already progressing from component replacement towards more advanced industrial capabilities, gradually expanding the range of problems they are equipped to solve.
Iran’s experience also fits a broader pattern identified by researchers studying technological development in emerging industrial economies, where practical production experience can gradually build capabilities that imported technology alone cannot provide.
Sanctions have complicated Iran’s access to some industrial technologies, financial services and equipment suppliers, making the development of domestic engineering capacity economically significant without making technological progress inevitable.
The United States Treasury’s sanctions framework includes provisions concerning significant transactions involving Iran’s mining sector.
When established suppliers become difficult to reach, domestic manufacturers gain opportunities to develop substitutes and capabilities over time.
A 2023 study in Resources Policy examined Iran’s steel industry and identified learning through production, engineering companies, equipment suppliers, research and development, technology licensing and joint manufacturing as important mechanisms for technological progress.
Iran’s diversity of mineral deposits provides potential demand across multiple industries, allowing manufacturers and contractors to develop products that serve copper, zinc, lead, gold and iron ore operations.
Chadormalu’s move underground places Iran’s wider mining capabilities before a practical test, bringing geological future into contact with the engineering demands of deeper extraction.
With the process advancing, Iran’s mining industry is set to eventually export more than minerals and processed metals, offering specialized equipment, engineering services and operational knowledge to other resource-producing economies.
The prospect deserves attention because it would shift part of the sector’s economic value from finite deposits towards expertise that can be refined, transferred and sold repeatedly.
This makes it easy to access the Press TV website