The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Sorted by date Results 176 - 200 of 248
FARO - Legendary mineral explorer W. Douglas "Doug" Eaton hurried forward to greet the group of visitors clambering out of the MD900 helicopter as its whirring blades whipped miniature cyclones of dust in the air. Eaton - unlike many of the geologists, engineers and mining executives the group would meet during a weeklong tour of mine sites, exploration camps and conferences around Yukon Territory - grinned from ear to ear. The early part of the territory-wide mining tour also would include visits to the Einarson Project...
In a long overdue step to bring Alaska into the 21st Century, state and federal agencies met in late June to discuss collaborative funding strategies for Alaska's Statewide Digital Mapping Initiative, an enterprise designed to create Alaska's first high-quality digital topographic map. The roundtable was convened by Alaska Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell and the Assistant Secretary for Water and Science, U.S. Department of Interior. Alaska remains the only state in the United States...
Although spring took its good old time in arriving across much of Alaska, the mining industry's busy summer exploration and development season has arrived. Five of Alaska's major mines reported strong first-quarter operating results, and two new companies acquired exploration properties in Alaska in the last month. These new acquisitions are not expected to be the last, as the prolonged venture capital drought continues with no end in sight. The news this month is sparse, prim...
The Nunavut Mining Symposium, held April 16-19 in Iqaluit, NU, the northern territory's capital, drew more than 500 delegates, a record for the annual gathering. Patricia M. Mohr, vice president of Scotiabank, delivered the keynote address, outlining the financial institution's 2012-13 outlook for metal prices, currencies and global growth. Mohr, a commodity market specialist at the Toronto-based international bank, said price increases in the bank's widely respected Metal & Mineral Index at 11.1 percent per annum during the...
The winds of change are once again blowing across Alaska's mineral industry, not only because the industry is gearing up for another busy summer season, but also because the mining investment climate has turned from cautiously optimistic to decidedly undecided. The sea change occurred steadily and without a lot of fanfare between mid-January and mid-March. As is always the case, good projects continue to advance with those that are drilling and adding resources or moving throu...
It is axiomatic that the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, and we who stand watch over America's mining industry know all too well that there is little the Detractors would rather do than to shut down this and all other basic manufacturing sectors. Witness a recent op-ed in the New York Times wherein Alaska's very own Carol Ann Woody advocated doing away with the General Mining Law of 1872 because, among other reasons, the Kensington Mine was allowed to go forward. Now I have not personally made the acquaintance of Ms....
I was tempted to make a few 2012 predictions now that 2011 is nearly gone, but I decided not to when I came across the following lines and was struck by how closely they mimic our current mining climate: "On a more local level, several old Alaska properties have been rejuvenated by new players to the Alaska mineral scene. Reserve announcements have touched off renewed land acquisitions and property negotiations. Contracts for technical personnel, drill rigs, helicopters and...
As a busy year in the Alaska and global mining industry starts to slide closer to its end, I figured now was a good time to gaze into my crystal ball (rutilated quartz, of course) to see what next year might bring. While strong metals prices promise another busy year for Alaska, a dose of global reality was provided by the financial giant Ernst & Young, who recently published a list of the top 10 business risks for the mining and metals industry for the coming year. Resource n...
Droves of exploration companies have rushed to Yukon Territory in recent years to hunt for sizable deposits of gold, silver, copper, rare earth elements and base metals. Employing the most advanced geophysical and geochemical techniques available, along with their best hunches, these explorers, like others around the globe, are pulling out all the stops to find commercial quantities of the minerals currently riding the winds of strong demand and high prices. But noticeably absent from the list of lucrative commodities being...
Whether it is multimillion-ounce gold discoveries, copper deposits that measure in the billions of pounds or massive ore-bodies of 20 percent zinc, Alaska is renowned for its mammoth deposits. The prospect of finding another Donlin, Pebble or Red Dog continues to draw explorers to this vast and underexplored corner of the United States. In the Survey of Mining Companies: 2010/2011, conducted by the Fraser Institute, top executives from 494 mining and mineral exploration...
With some 20 million ounces of gold enveloped in a deposit that outcrops alongside a paved road in Interior Alaska, International Tower Hill Mines Ltd.'s Livengood project is ideally situated to become a top-tier gold operation - or, as the company's new CEO James Komadina put it, "A mine-builder's dream." "Rarely in my career have I encountered a project that has so much going for it: the resource is one of the largest and ideally situated gold deposits in the world; it is...
Millrock Resources Inc. is artfully implementing the science of making grassroots gold and copper discoveries, proving the promise of these new finds and vending the prospects to other companies to do the heavy lifting of defining a deposit. This business model is paying off for the project generator. Some US$11 million is being spent on exploring its Alaska copper and gold prospects in 2011, with nearly US$10 million funded by its project partners. Senior miners Teck...
From deploying its own geologists to make grassroots discoveries to partnering with junior explorers with strong geological know-how and enticing projects, Teck Resources Ltd. is seeking new high-quality deposits of zinc, copper and gold across Alaska and Canada's North. "In terms of our overall exploration strategy, it has three parts to it: One is doing our own grassroots, regional exploration; the second arena we get involved with is joint ventures with junior companies; an...
Leveraging its global dominance in the realm of rare earth elements, China has set in motion a strategy to gain supremacy in manufacturing the vast array of technologically advanced products that depend on these metals. "China can exploit rare earths that they control all the way out to electric cars, wind turbines, whatever it is - and that is the grand strategy," American Elements Chairman and CEO Michael Silver told some 200 participants in the Alaska Strategic and...
A recent article in the Newsletter of the Society of Economic Geologists discussed ways of addressing an arresting trend in the mining industry that affects Alaska's mining future. Authors N. Stephen Enders of the Colorado School of Mines and Cliff Saunders of Too Serious Unlimited, showed that the discovery rate for gold has been dropping steadily since 1999, while the gold mined by operating mines worldwide has remained essentially unchanged at about 80 million ounces per year. The low for ounces discovered coincided with...
Despite the abundance of good news from the Alaska mining industry this month, there is an unusual black cloud hanging over the industry that threatens to rain on our parade of projects. Domestic and international markets got a severe case of the jitters during the recent United States debt crisis. The resulting economic uncertainty contributed to significant metal price volatility. For example, the London gold price jumped 20 percent, from about US$1,480 to US$1,770 during the month prior to the debt deferral and has since d...
Alaska boasts some of the largest metals deposits on earth as well as vast quantities of coal, oil and natural gas. Ironically, companies such as Donlin Gold LLC (formerly Donlin Creek LLC) and Pebble Limited Partnership are looking overseas to find a reliable source of natural gas as they study the economics of building global-scale mines at their projects. "My guess is, our base case will be imported LNG. Which seems sort of weird to import natural gas into the State of...
The last month has seen a massive transition in Alaska from planning to execution, from getting ready to go to the field to boots on the outcrop and drills in the ground. Each year the hustle and bustle of the Alaska summer exploration season subsumes virtually everything else (except the Stanley Cup) as field programs launch around the state. This year has been no different with base metal programs in the Brooks Range, gold programs in Interior Alaska and the Seward...
The mineral project generator model is paying dividends for Millrock Resources Inc. The junior anticipates exploration on its Alaska gold properties to top US$10 million in 2011, with more than US$9 million to be funded by project partners. Millrock has attracted senior miners Teck Resources Ltd. and Kinross Gold Corp. to some of the Alaska gold projects it has generated. Additionally, junior explorers Crescent Resources Corp., Brixton Metals Corp. and Ryan Gold Corp. also...
Some months ago I was talking to a senior exploration manager regarding the lack of new discoveries worldwide in the last few years. The subject came up of just how rare a +1-million-ounce gold deposit really was. Then last week one of our project geologists lays a publication in front of me entitled "How Rare are One Million Ounce Gold Deposits?" by Natural Resources Holdings, Ltd. Although this publication comes at the question from the standpoint of which new deposits are...
Can mining and Alaska co-exist? This query was the crux of Anglo American plc CEO Cynthia Carroll's message to Alaskans attending a March 3 gathering in Anchorage sponsored by the Resource Development Council. Carroll, whose company owns a 50 percent stake in the Pebble Project, said economic benefits from developing the enormous copper-gold-molybdenum project would emanate from Southwest Alaska and extend around the world, a message that resonated with the pro-development...
A revitalized Yukon Territory is ushering in a new era of mining prosperity as two more mines enter production this winter. "For the first time in a generation," the territory will have three operating mines that together will employ more than 400 workers and provide 100 direct service jobs and countless indirect positions and generate C$800 million for the Yukon economy annually," said Yukon Premier Dennis Fentie. "That's almost as much as the Government of Yukon's entire C$1 billion yearly budget." The recent startup of...
As mining heats up in Yukon Territory, professionals from around the globe are finding new roles in the region and employing a host of unique experiences and perspectives in pursuit of exploration, development and production of the territory's minerals. This growing international contingent covers the industry spectrum and hails from around the globe. Their presence is most evident in exploration camps scattered across the Yukon; however, the new manager of Yukon's sole producer, Capstone Mining Corp.'s Minto Mine, is a...
As termination dust falls across most of Alaska, the curtain has come down for the bulk of the exploration projects around the state; however, mine development programs as well as mine-site exploration continue apace as does some exploration work in tropical Southeast Alaska. With few exceptions, preliminary conclusions drawn from 2010 work indicate that 2011 is going to be a busy year. And though a lot of exploration and development is still going on for gold, copper...
The Last Frontier, as Alaska has long been labeled, is as applicable a moniker today as it was to prospectors who ventured to the territory at the end of the 19th century. Alaska is considered one of the most mineralized provinces on Earth, but due to an inter-related combination of Arctic weather, rugged terrain, limited infrastructure and high exploration costs, the state's vast mineral potential remains at the edge of exploratory expansion. Though the Far North state...
