Australia has been a diamond producer since the nineteenth century. For practical purposes, this list also contains stone, marble and other quarries.. As of October 2012, there were 405 operating mines in Australia. 1 ARGYLE DIAMOND MINE (DIAMONDS) Is there anything more valuable than a diamond? It was the first large-scale operation for recovering diamonds in Australia. Australia’s largest and most economic diamond deposit has been the Argyle Mine, in the East Kimberley region of Western Australia. She then traced the source of the diamonds to the headwaters of Smoke Creek, which led to the legendary Argyle pipe. 1980: Evaluating Argyle’s potential The underground mine should extend Argyle's life until at least 2020. Perth-headquartered Lucapa Diamond Company (Lucapa), which operates the Lulo and Mothae mines in Angola and Lesotho, respectively, has confirmed its intention to acquire Australia’s only other remaining diamond mine, the Merlin Diamond Mine in the Northern Territory, from the liquidators of previous owner Merlin Diamonds Ltd. The Argyle mine is 100% controlled by Rio Tinto Ltd. (although until late 2000 it was a joint venture with Rio Tinto [56.8%], Ashton Mining Ltd. [38.2%], and the Western Australian Diamond Trust [5%]). The largest diamond mine on Earth, Argyle Diamond Mine near Kununurra, produces a dazzling 20 million carats of diamonds yearly. The largest diamond found so far in Australia was mined at the Merlin Mine, Northern Territory, in 2003 and weighed 104.73 carats. Lucapa Diamond Company has announced the recovery of the 23rd 100-plus carat diamond from the Lulo alluvial diamond mine in Angola, Africa. That’s because 2020 was a transitional year for the nation’s diamond sector with the permanent closure of Argyle, its only operational diamond mine. United States Diamond Production Today, we are one of the world's largest producers of rough diamonds from our two mines – Argyle in Western Australia and Diavik in Canada's Northwest Territories. The open pit mine at Argyle had been a steady producer of diamonds since 1983 and the world's leading source of natural fancy-colored diamonds. Located 185 kilometres from Kununurra in WA, the Argyle Diamond mine … This list of mines in Australia is subsidiary to the list of mines article and lists working, defunct and planned mines in the country organised by primary mineral output. Actually, yes – a pink diamond. As one of Australia’s most prolific mines, Argyle produced 865 million carats over 37 years, including 90 percent of the world’s rare pink diamonds. Argyle has been in operation since 1983 and Diavik since 2003. On 2 October 1979, Maureen Muggeridge, one of the best known women in Australia’s mining industry, discovered diamond samples in the floodplain of a small creek that flowed in Lake Argyle. It’s never been easy to find a diamond mine and the issues encountered during the discovery and establishment of Australia’s three diamond production centres at Argyle, Ellendale and Merlin prove just that. In 2013, Rio Tinto opened the new Argyle underground diamond mine in Western Australia. It’s the world’s largest producer of natural champagne and cognac diamonds and is famous for one of the rarest and most valuable precious stones on the planet – pink diamonds. Our Argyle diamond mine, which sits on the traditional country of the Miriuwung, Gidja, Malgnin and Wularr people in Western Australia, became one of the world’s largest producers of diamonds and the largest supplier of natural coloured diamonds – …