FCX Freeport McMoRan Inc

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc.'s (FCX) spending on its projects will likely rise 37% in 2012, as three major copper expansions are due to be approved.

Freeport has plenty of cash to work with. In the third quarter, its net profit was $1.05 billion, even as a workers' strike in Indonesia cut copper and gold production.

The world's largest listed copper producer expects to boost its capital expenditures by $1 billion to $3.7 billion next year, from $2.7 billion this year, Chief Executive Richard Adkerson said in a conference call Wednesday.

The additional spending will go toward expanding operations at Freeport's Morenci mine in the U.S., its Cerro Verde mine in Peru and the Tenke Fungurume operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo. These projects have yet to be approved by the board of directors, Adkerson said.

Kathleen Quirk, chief financial officer at Freeport, said the additional spending will likely be "evenly distributed between those three projects."

The company plans to triple ore-mill throughput at Cerro Verde, where construction is expected to begin in 2013.

"We have the opportunity to (get access to) the power and water resources, which is a challenge in Northern Chile and Peru," Adkerson said.

At Morenci, the company plans to complete by the end of the year a feasibility study on expanding its ore-milling operations, Adkerson said.

"This would lead to further large-scale expansion at Morenci," Adkerson said.

At Tenke, the company has been operating its existing mill beyond design capacity and has taken advantage of this to increase production.

Now, Freeport is "looking at our first expansion beyond the original project," Adkerson said.

-By Tatyana Shumsky, Dow Jones Newswires; 212-416-3095; tatyana.shumsky@dowjones.com

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