Starting up one of the world’s biggest copper refineriesCopper refinery, PT. Freeport Indonesia was using a typical electrolyteElectrolyte containing [Cu] of 50 gpl, Free Acid of 170 gpl, [As] of 3 gpl and [Cl] of 0.05 gpl. While anodesAnode quality has a range of Cu and O2 of 99.4–99.7% and 500–600 ppm, respectively. Due to the limited number of anodesAnode, the only option was to start one group out of 16 groups, using only 10% of the designDesign capacity. This gap affected the performancePerformance of equipmentEquipment, such as pumps and heaters. Another limiting factor was unavailability of the solution purification section at that stage. To mitigate soluble impuritiesImpurity and copperCopper from the anodesAnode, circulating five additional cell groups was conducted. This provides challenges in additivesAdditives dosing, and some iterations of additivesAdditives dosing was conducted during the start-up. Despite the unusual set-up and typical start-upStart-up challenges, such as unwanted stops, the copper refineryCopper refinery start-up was successful, producing LME gradeGrade A from the first cathodeCathode. Result of 2nd cycle shows significant improvement in quality improved production by minimizing dendrite growth and increasing current efficiencyCurrent efficiency and further, the result of the 3rd cycle is shown to produce best cathodeCathode among these three cycles.