The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
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Explorers seeking new mineral discoveries in the Northwest Territories are expected to spend less in 2018 than the C$90 million they shelled out collectively last year. Natural Resources Canada projects spending this year for mineral exploration and deposit appraisals in the northern territory will total C$81.3 million. But some observers expect to see an uptick in hardrock mining exploration in 2018, especially in the highly prospective Slave Province where the Northwest...
Those of you that attended the recent Cordilleran Roundup Convention in Vancouver can attest to the exuberant, upbeat atmosphere that pervaded the conference and was very much in evidence at the standing-room only festivities at our annual self-hosted Alaska Night meet and greet. But digging down under this veneer of optimism, many of the junior explorers and most of the producers admitted to their expectations of challenging times in 2019. Putting words to this apparent...
Royal Gold Inc. Feb. 6 said it has two criteria for any mining company interested in buying the Peak Gold project in Alaska – a willingness to make building a mine at the high-grade gold project a priority and a commitment to use the highest standards to do so. "Royal Gold will remain committed to the project over the long term through our existing royalty interests, and our considerations for any potential transfer of ownership will include a commitment to advance the project...
Avalon Advanced Materials Inc. Jan. 30 reported that Cheetah Resources Pty Ltd., a private company based in Australia, will participate in the development of the Nechalacho rare earth elements project at Thor Lake, roughly 100 kilometers (60 miles) southeast of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories. In 2013, Avalon published a feasibility study for a mine at Nechalacho that is calculated to produce 9,286 metric tons of rare earths, 19,763 metric tons of zirconium, 2,231 metric...
I, for one, feel vindicated, relieved and ready to face the New Year! How so, you ask? Please let me explain. For those of you who remember my column in November, I noted that EY Global Mining and Metals publishes an annual "risk radar" for mining and metals, outlining what mining companies perceive as the top ten risks facing them in the near future. This publication was for the years 2017-2018 and stated that "Our number one risk this year is digital effectiveness." If you...
Contango ORE Inc. Jan. 23 announced that the Peak Gold mine project near the crossroads town of Tok in Eastern Interior Alaska is officially up for sale. The Peak Gold project is owned by a joint venture between Contango ORE (60 percent) and a subsidiary of Royal Gold Inc. (40 percent). Royal Gold, which manages the work under the joint venture, has retained Scotia Capital Inc. to conduct a joint process for the sale of the Peak Gold properties in Alaska. Given the high gold...
As the year waned, Alaska's mining industry reported some of the last of its 2018 seasonal field results while the University of Alaska and state of Alaska released some current and projected state-wide economics. At the same time, some macro-economic data was released for the global mining industry. Combined, these figures show a mix of encouraging and not so encouraging trends facing the Alaska mining industry. At the global scale, things for the mining industry are looking...
WESTERN ALASKA Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. announced that it had finalized a surface right of way agreement with Alaska Peninsula Corporation for use of that latter's lands for the construction and operation of transportation infrastructure associated with the Pebble copper-molybdenum-gold project. Alaska Peninsula Corporation is an Alaska Native village corporation with extensive land holdings proximal to the Pebble site and more than 900 shareholders, many of which live...
Members of the Kaminak Gold Corp. executive team have reunited to form Tectonic Metals Corp., a private exploration company that has acquired three overlooked gold exploration properties in Alaska's Eastern Interior. While with Kaminak, this team advanced the Coffee project in the Yukon from a grassroots discovery to a roughly 5-million-ounce gold mine project that Goldcorp Inc. acquired in 2017 for C$520 million. Cashing in on Coffee, several of the Kaminak executives moved...
Excited about the robust economics outlined in a preliminary economic assessment finalized in October, Peak Gold partners – Contango ORE Inc. (60 percent) and Royal Gold Inc. (40 percent) are now looking at the potential of bringing on a partner to advance their high-grade gold deposit in eastern Alaska toward development. "We are at a point I think where it would be healthy to have somebody else come in and move the project forward with their skill set," Royal Gold P...
As Alaska's mining industry nears the end of another hectic year during which metals prices and investor sentiments rose and fell as precipitously as the world's major stock exchanges, the industry is naturally looking into its crystal ball trying to anticipate what the new year will bring. EY Global Mining and Metals does this sort of forecasting by putting out an annual "risk radar" for mining and metals. The idea is to find out what the industry perceives as the top ten...
The verdict is in – the economics of developing an open-pit mine at Peak Gold look tantalizing and Royal Gold Inc. is committed to being involved with this Eastern Interior Alaska gold-silver project for the long haul. Discovered by Contango ORE Inc. in 2009, the Peak Gold project hosts two skarn deposits – Main Peak and North Peak – on an underexplored property that covers roughly 850,000 acres west and south of Tok, a crossroads town on the Alaska Highway. A preli...
Contango ORE Inc. Aug. 30 said a preliminary economic assessment (PEA) for the Peak Gold (formerly Tetlin) project in eastern Alaska is slated for completion by the end of September. Being advanced by a joint venture between Contango ORE (60 percent) and Royal Gold Inc. (40 percent), the Peak Gold project hosts two parallel gold-rich skarn deposits – Main Peak and North Peak – and 850,000 acres of underexplored and highly prospective land. The two Peak skarn deposits host a g...
Underscoring the interconnected nature of the global mining market, not 48 hours after the John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act was signed into law, the mining industry began wondering out loud how they were going to produce rare earth element, tungsten, tantalum and molybdenum in the near future. Why these metals and why the worry now? Because one of the many impacts the Defense Authorization Act will have on the U.S. economy is its ban on the U.S. Department of...
New Age Metals Inc. Aug. 29 announced the completion of a technical report that outlines a three-year plan for furthering exploration at its Genesis platinum group metals-copper-nickel project in Southcentral Alaska. Located about 75 miles north of Valdez and less than three miles from the paved highway leading to the port town, Genesis is an underexplored project that covers a 5.6-mile stretch of know PGM mineralization. This mineralization includes a drill-ready reef style...
Although the Alaska mineral industry is in better health in the middle of 2018 than it has been in the last five years, the spirited recovery that was in progress in the first quarter of the year is now looking more like a dead-cat bounce – a minor recovery after a long down trend. This is particularly true of the exploration sector. Reviewing the Alaska minerals industry, you will note that several exploration projects are only now commencing their 2018 exploration p...
Northwest Territories may fall behind Canada's two other territories in mining activity in the near-future, but projects underway in the northern jurisdiction hold substantial promise for mid- to long-term gains, especially if many current roadblocks come down. "Optimism is warranted for the territory's mining sector and the broader economy it drives," said Wally Schumann, minister of industry, tourism and investment for the Government of Northwest Territories. But...
A vital ingredient in stainless steel and superalloys, chromium is considered by the United States Geological Survey as "one of the Nation's most important strategic and critical materials." "Because there is no viable substitute for chromium in the production of stainless steel and because the United States has small chromium resources, there has been concern about domestic supply during every national military emergency since World War I," the USGS explains. Rich chromite...
One of the most common complaints I hear from companies and individuals working in the mineral industry in Alaska is our deplorable lack of modern, usable-scale digital geophysical and geologic maps. How bad is it? Consider this: the U.S. Geological Survey has estimated that less than 2 percent of Alaska has acceptable geophysical data coverage, and less than 20 percent has been geologically mapped at a scale useful to evaluate the state's mineral resources. Nobody will deny...
An early spring coupled with low snow fall in many parts of Alaska have combined to enable companies large and small to start their summer field programs early this year. As expected, competition is stiff for people, drills, helicopters, heavy equipment and related services, awarding those who committed budgets early and penalizing those who did not or could not commit early. For the first time in half a decade, projects with money at hand may not be able to get the services t...
The six platinum group elements – platinum, palladium, rhodium, ruthenium, iridium, and osmium – are amongst the rarest metals on Earth. This scarcity, coupled with PGEs' uses in the automotive, petrochemical and electronics industries, has this group of metals firmly planted on the United States Geological Survey's critical minerals list. "PGEs are indispensable to many industrial applications but are mined in only a few places," USGS inked in a 2017 report on platinum gro...
There has never been anything ordinary about the Peak Gold (formerly Tetlin) project, or the companies that are exploring the high-grade gold skarn deposits found there. In a move that continues this tradition of extraordinary, Royal Gold Inc. has acquired a 13.6 percent stake in Contango ORE Inc. Neither of these companies are your prototypical mineral explorer and their involvement in the Peak Gold project continues to defy the norms for the industry and their own operating...
New Age Metals Inc. April 18 announced that it has signed an agreement with Anglo Alaska Gold Corp. to acquire full ownership of the Genesis, a 10,240-acre, drill-ready platinum group metal project about 75 highway miles north of the all-weather port city of Valdez. "NAM (New Age Metals) uses the prospector generator model and after the preliminary field work and additional ground proofing, our objective is to find an option/joint venture partner to further the development of...
Thanks largely to increased investments from Aussie mining explorers, mineral exploration spending across Alaska topped US$100 million in 2018. This is well above the roughly US$95 million invested last year and nearly double the US$58 million spent at the bottom of the market in 2015. "Canadian and Australian companies continue to be the source for the bulk of funds spent in Alaska in 2018, together comprising well over 80 percent of the exploration expenditures earmarked...
Peak Gold, a joint venture between Contango ORE Inc. (60 percent) and Royal Gold Inc. (40 percent), is beginning to investigate the economics of mining the gold-rich Peak and North Peak skarn deposits that it has outlined at Peak Gold (formerly Tetlin), an extensive land package near the crossroads town of Tok in Alaska's Eastern Interior. The 2018 program also includes exploring for new skarn deposits near the Peak deposits, as well as evaluating the potential for porphyry...
