The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Sorted by date Results 26 - 50 of 63
Fortune Minerals Ltd. reported Dec. 4 the startup of a $3.8 million pilot plant last month at SGS Lakefield Research Limited in Ontario for its Nico cobalt-gold-bismuth deposit in the Northwest Territories. Fortune aims to confirm the economic feasibility of producing precious and base metals from NICO. A total of 180 metric tons of ore mined from the Nico deposit during the 2006 and 2007 underground test mining programs will be processed by May, the company said. Underground mining tests conducted at Nico produced about...
Alaska Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell has appealed a lower court ruling to the Alaska Supreme Court concerning the proposed Alaska Clean Water Initiative, he said in a statement Nov. 7. The lieutenant governor denied certification of the proposed 07WATR initiative submitted earlier this year by Art Hackney, who represents the Renewable Resource Coalition, on grounds that it appropriated a water resource from one user group for another. The coalition is a group that is fighting proposed development of the giant Pebble...
Hecla Mining Co. Feb. 21 posted 2007 income applicable to common shareholders of $52.2 million, or 43 cents per common share, on revenue of $222.6 million. Though the results reflected nearly a 24 percent drop in yearly earnings from $68.6 million, or 57 cents per common share, on revenue of $218.9 million in 2006, Hecla observed that it was still the second-strongest outcome in the company's 117-year-old history despite a significant reduction in gold production from its La Camorra unit as mining transitioned to a single...
True North Gems has expanded its Beluga sapphire property by staking six additional claims, thereby doubling holdings. The Beluga sapphire property, now covers 38 square kilometers, or nearly 24 square miles, is located near the hamlet of Kimmirut, along the south coast of Baffin Island, Nunavut Territory. The Vancouver, B.C.-based junior staked the new claims to cover additional occurrences of sapphire and scapolite, a diagnostic indicator mineral, extending to the southwest and southeast from the known sapphire...
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers initiated a 30-day public comment period Jan. 14 on a permit application from Teck Cominco Alaska Inc. to increase the size of the tailings compound at its Red Dog zinc-lead mine near Kotzebue. In the application, Teck Cominco said it needed more holding capacity at the mine to maintain the integrity of the tailings facility, which is an important part of the mine's waste treatment system. Specifically, added capacity would raise the crest elevation of the main tailings dam at Red Dog by 10...
Yukon-Nevada Gold Corp. and No Name Resources Inc. won the Yukon Territory's 2007 Robert E. Leckie awards for outstanding quartz (hard rock) and placer reclamation practices, respectively. The awards were announced Nov. 26 at the Yukon Geoscience Forum Awards Banquet in Whitehorse. Yukon Nevada Gold drew praise for its reclamation work at Ketza River; and No Name Resources for its reclamation activities at Ten Mile and Thirteen Mile creeks. Yukon officials also awarded honorable mentions to Selwyn Resources Ltd. for...
Andover Ventures Inc. has released the assay results from the final seven holes of its 2007 drill season at the Sun property west of Kotzebue in the Ambler Mining District of Northwest Alaska. Four of the assay results were from the northernmost holes drilled at Sun. These holes were drilled in four fences at step-outs of 150 meters (492 feet) to the northeast. Two of the fences were north of what was originally considered the main Sun deposit, and the positive assay results have extended the deposit by 300 meters (984...
Hemis Corp., an international resource company, said it has completed the first phase of a gold exploration program in Alaska. The Anchor Gold project in the Cook Inlet of Alaska is a venture between Las Vegas-based Hemis and Aspen Exploration Corp. Hemis said the emphasis of the Anchor Gold project is exploring for gold in offshore deposits along the eastern margin of Cook Inlet. Previous work by Aspen Exploration documented offshore aeromagnetic anomalies in addition to confirming the presence of gold along the active...
Teck Cominco Alaska Inc. released the final report Nov. 29 of a six-year study that concludes it is safe to consume subsistence foods in all areas near the Red Dog Mine in northwestern Alaska without restrictions. The final report of the "DeLong Mountain Regional Transportation System Fugitive Dust Risk Assessment" incorporated formal comments and input from a wide range of government agencies and stakeholders, including local village residents," said Wayne Hall, Red Dog Mine's Senior Environmental Coordinator. Ore...
Canada's ministries of Fisheries and Oceans and Natural Resources have joined the attorney general of Canada and Imperial Metals Corp. subsidiary bcMetals Corp. in appealing a Sept. 25 ruling of the Federal Court of Canada, which set aside a federal screening report issued May 2006 on bcMetals' Red Chris project, according to Imperial Metals. At issue is the nature of the discretion of federal authorities to scope a project under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. Imperial is pursuing startup in 2008 of Red Chris, a...
North of 60 Mining News has appointed a new management team led by contractor Rose Ragsdale and Shane Lasley. The changes follow the departure of former Editor-in-Chief Sarah Hurst. Veteran journalist Rose Ragsdale has been appointed contract editor-in-chief of Mining News after serving for three years as a freelance contributor to the newspaper. Ragsdale, a longtime Alaska reporter and editor, also serves as a regular freelance contributor and contract writer for Petroleum News, a sister publication. Shane Lasley, former...
U.S. Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, spoke out at a congressional hearing Oct. 18 on issues facing the state under the Clean Water Act. The hearing before the U.S. House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, which Young chairs, examined the successes and challenges of the law in the 35 years since it was enacted, touching on court battles over two Alaska mines and a park in Fairbanks. Alaska contains 63 percent of the total wetland acreage in the United States (excluding Hawaii), according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Se...
The Canadian government has undertaken a $150 million initiative to streamline Canada's regulatory system tha will protect the environment and improve the competitiveness of Canada's resource industries. By creating a new Major Projects Management Office, announced Oct. 1, Canada aims to improve coordination within Canada's regulatory system by providing industry with a single, efficient point of entry into the federal process. "Our government is taking action and reducing red tape to give Canada's natural resources industry...
Average base salaries paid to mining site workers in Canada climbed 3.8 percent since 2006, according to findings of an independent annual survey. In addition, 80 percent of the staffers were eligible for short-term cash incentives this year, compared with 73 percent in 2006, reported Coopers Consulting Ltd. and PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP in the "2007 Mining Industry Salary Surveys." The average bonus paid in 2007 climbed to 16 percent of base salaries, compared with 13 percent a year earlier. Chief executive officers of...
Federal regulators withdrew approval in late September for a permit that would allow the release of treated wastewater from Alaska's largest mine into waterways near the village of Kivalina, a Northwest Alaska village located 66 miles downstream from the mine. The Environmental Protection Agency says the five-year wastewater discharge permit it issued in March was partly flawed because it used old data on water use and dust emissions at the Red Dog zinc-lead mine in northwest Alaska. An EPA internal review board in...
Stornoway Diamond Corp. and Teck Cominco Ltd. have uncovered promising kimberlites in separate exploration programs in Nunavut Territory this summer. Stornoway, one of Canada's leading diamond hunters, announced discovery Aug. 23 of a new kimberlite pipe at the Aviat Project, the company's northernmost venture in eastern Nunavut. Teck Cominco discovered four new kimberlites during its first drilling campaign on the Darby Project, bringing to nine the total number of kimberlites uncovered so far on the 685,000-acre property,...
Kivalina residents chased away by flood warnings began trickling back home early Sept. 14 after the season's first storm died down, ending its assault on a frail seawall guarding the northwest coastal village. Wave action from the storm began eroding the shoreline, threatening to wash away parts of the village, which is located about 80 miles north of Kotzebue near the Red Dog Mine and creating the potential for an oil spill from the Alaska Village Electrical Cooperative fuel tank farm. About 85 percent of Kivalina's 330 resi...
Niblack Mining Corp. Sept. 20 announced the start of portal construction and tunneling at its copper-zinc-gold-silver Niblack Project in southeast Alaska. Niblack Mining, a Vancouver, B.C.-based junior exploration company, is pursuing an advanced underground exploration project at Niblack, which is located off Moira Sound on southeastern Prince of Wales Island about 30 miles southwest of Ketchikan The underground program, which will cover 6,000 feet of tunnel development, is designed to provide drill access to areas beneath...
Sherwood Copper Corp. has completed phase 1 construction of the Minto copper-gold mine ahead of schedule and essentially on budget, while production continues to ramp up at the central Yukon Territory mine. Sherwood, a Vancouver, British Columbia-based junior mining company, expects to recover 300 million pounds of copper, 122,000 ounces of gold and 1.8 million ounces of silver from Minto over the life of the original mine plan. The operation's mill is currently undergoing commissioning and is expected to ramp up to full...
A joint panel created by the governments of British Columbia and Canada has ruled against the Kemess North copper-gold mine project as currently proposed by Northgate Minerals Corp., saying the project would not be in the public's interest, B.C. officials announced Sept. 17. "In the panel's view, the economic and social benefits provided by the project, on balance, are outweighed by the risks of significant adverse environmental, social and cultural effects, some of which may not emerge until many years after mining...
The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation is seeking public comment on its plans to issue an air quality control minor permit to Teck Cominco Alaska Inc. for the Red Dog Mine in northwest Alaska, according to a public notice published June 22. Teck Cominco plans to install a 50,000 cubic feet per minute baghouse, or giant industrial filter, to control dust emissions that are escaping from the coarse ore storage building at the huge zinc and lead mine. Teck Cominco has been monitoring the level of ore concentrate...
Workers at the huge Ekati Diamond Mine in the Northwest Territories may soon enter a third month on strike with no end to the walkout in sight. The Ekati mine is 186 miles Northeast of Yellowknife and 124 miles south of the Arctic Circle. It became Canada's first diamond mine when it opened in 1998 at a cost of C$900 million. Ekati currently produces 6 percent of the world's diamonds. The mine's 400 unionized workers walked off the job April 7 when last-ditch talks broke down. The Public Service Alliance of Canada, the union...
Tom Irwin has joined Golden Valley Electric Association as vice president of governmental and public affairs, a newly created position, GVEA said in a statement Jan. 16. Irwin, 59, is a mining industry veteran with more than 30 years of management experience. He stepped down from his job as commissioner of the Alaska Department of Natural Resources in October after disagreeing with Gov. Frank H. Murkowski about the direction of the state's natural gas pipeline negotiations with the North Slope producers. At GVEA, Irwin will...
Full Metal Minerals Ltd. has launched an eight-hole drilling program covering 1,200 meters at the Lucky Shot Gold Project, about 40 miles north of Anchorage. The program - the initial phase of exploration at Lucky Shot by the Vancouver, British Columbia-based company - will target an extension to the Coleman Vein at the Lucky Shot Mine. The mine is in the second largest historic lode-gold producing region in Alaska. From 1908 to 1951 Lucky Shot operated as one of the richest in Alaska, producing 252,000 ounces of gold at an...
Tri-Valley Corp. said July 18 that its wholly owned subsidiary Select Resources Corp. has purchased the Admiral Calder Calcium Carbonate Mine and associated assets from Sealaska Corp. and SeaCal LLC. Bakersfield, Calif.-based Tri-Valley said the calcium mine is on the northwestern coast of Prince of Wales Island. It was discovered around 1905 and mined from 1907-10 for high white and statuary grade marble. Current mining operations began in 1999. Tri-Valley said the mine has 13.9 million tons of drill-proven and probable...
