FRUTILLAR, CHILE (June 4, 2025) — In line with its commitment to sustainability and responsible mining, Codelco — the world’s largest copper mining corporation — has partnered with Lemu, Latin America’s leading Nature Tech company, to explore new ways of monitoring and protecting biodiversity across its areas of influence.
The agreement establishes a six-month pilot programme to test Atlas, Lemu’s Nature Intelligence platform that makes environmental data visible, measurable, and actionable. Atlas enables organisations to visualise, track, and analyse biodiversity indicators and ecosystem metrics with scientific accuracy and ease of use.
Looking ahead, Atlas will also integrate data from Lemu Nge — meaning “Forest Eye” in Mapudungun — the world’s first biodiversity-focused hyperspectral satellite. Roughly the size of a shoebox, Lemu Nge orbits Earth at nearly 600 km, capturing high-resolution imagery across 32 spectral bands to detect changes in ecosystems that are invisible to the human eye.
During the pilot, Codelco will have free access to Atlas while providing feedback to help adapt the platform to the operational realities of large-scale mining. “The goal is for Lemu to refine its platform with data that reflects the reality of a mining company,” said María José Ruiz-Esquide, Corporate Director of Climate Change and Decarbonisation at Codelco. “We will test it directly in our sites and areas of influence, review its performance, use it, and share feedback.”
The collaboration also reflects a broader trend: public–private partnerships driving innovation. “When you look at the most successful technologies in the world, they all come from collaborations between the public and private sectors,” said Leo Prieto, Founder and CEO of Lemu. “Working with Codelco — a pioneer in considering not only its impacts and dependencies on nature, but also how nature relates to its operations — is tremendously important for us. It allows us to validate our tools, our platform, and our satellite against the highest standards.”
For Codelco, the partnership offers more than off-the-shelf solutions. “This is a unique platform, not something that already exists in the market,” Ruiz-Esquide emphasised. “It’s not about buying a generic product, but about developing a solution tailored specifically to the reality of our operations.”
Together, Codelco and Lemu aim to set a new benchmark for environmental management in mining, demonstrating how cutting-edge technology can support biodiversity conservation at industrial scale.
