JAKARTA, Oct 15 (Reuters) -

Freeport Indonesia has halted copper cathode production at

its Manyar smelter after a fire on Monday, the company's chief

executive said in an interview with Kompas TV on Tuesday.

The

fire occurred

at a sulphuric acid unit at the Manyar site, located in

East Java province, and was extinguished late on Monday, the

company said in statement on Tuesday, adding it was still

looking into the cause.

"Copper cathode production will exhaust the sulfuric gas

that must be captured by this plant. With the occurrence of the

fire, we will halt the production process," Freeport Indonesia

Chief Executive Tony Wenas said.

Tony said the length of the production halt would depend

on an investigation of the smelter fire and the company would

review its production process.

The $3.7 billion copper smelter was completed in June

and

started

output in September. However, production was

delayed until November

due to water and steam leakage during an initial test

period.

The plant was expected to reach full capacity in January

2025 but Freeport will re-evaluate plans to ramp up production

following the fire, it said in the statement.

The smelter has an annual input capacity of 1.7 million

metric tons of copper concentrate, which could produce around

900,000 tons of copper cathode, 50 tons of gold and 210 tons of

silver a year.

There were no casualties or injuries after the incident at

the smelter, the CEO said.