The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Sorted by date Results 1276 - 1300 of 1467
Alaska's mining industry captured the attention, not only of Alaskans but also the country during the past year when a controversy over the proposed Pebble Project in Southwest Alaska bubbled to the surface. Supporters and opponents of a ballot initiative aimed at blocking the mining venture squared off in a vocal and often strident campaign that made headlines nationwide. Alaska Miners Association director Steve Borell cited the contest over development the world-class...
Yukon Zinc Corp. moved closer to startup of the Wolverine Project in Southeast Yukon Territory recently by gaining regulatory approval of its tailings and infrastructure design and construction plan. Two Chinese companies, Jinduicheng Molybdenum Group Ltd. and Northwest Nonferrous International Investment Co. Ltd., acquired all of the public shares of Vancouver, B.C.-based Yukon Zinc last summer. Since then, the private company has quietly advanced the development of Wolverine. The Yukon government April 14 said it approved...
There are some new stats out from the State of Alaska that I thought you might like to see. For 2008, the Alaska mining industry accounted for 3,500 direct jobs and 5,500 indirect jobs. The industry doled out US$350 million in payroll with the average salary totaling US$82,600 per year, which is 90 percent higher than the statewide average for all sectors. Mining salaries were higher than all other sectors, except for the oil and gas sector. The industry paid US$105 million in...
TORONTO - For a first-timer, attending the 77th Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada annual International Convention, Trade Show and Investors Exchange overwhelmed, teased, tantalized and downright exhausted. Though folks remarked that convention attendance seemed down from the record-breaking levels of recent years, one couldn't discern any slackening in the steady streams of dark-suited conventioneers pouring onto the escalators in the multistoried convention hall, or crowding into meeting rooms at neighboring...
Yukon Territory has one producing mine, the Minto copper-gold-silver operation near the Yukon River north of Whitehorse. During 2008, more than 150 active hardrock exploration projects in the territory, 73 of which recording spending greater than C$100,000, and 22 posted outlays greater $1 million. Here's a look at some of the mining companies active in Yukon Territory. Producing mines Sherwood Copper Corp., now a part of Capstone Mining Corp., took the Minto Mine, Yukon Territory's only producing hard rock mine, to new...
The Northwest Territories has four operating mines: three diamond producers and one long-running tungsten operation. Exploration and development activity was brisk in 2008 with the most advanced projects located in the Slave Province. Here's a look at mining companies active during 2008 in the Northwest Territories: Producing mines BHP Billiton Diamonds Inc. (80 percent) and partners C. Fipke (10 percent) and S. Blusson (10 percent) produced about 3.5 million carats of rough diamonds at the Ekati diamond mine in 2008, making...
Committee Bay Resources Ltd. completed a 5-to-1 share consolidation in February. The restructured company also changed its name to CBR Gold Corp. As a result of the name change, the company began trading on the TSX Venture Exchange under the new stock symbol CBG March 2. The newly consolidated company is currently planning to spend about C$5 million in 2009 on its two advanced exploration projects in North America; the Niblack gold-copper rich volcanogenic massive sulfide...
The plummet in base metal prices in 2008 will be felt across Alaska and Northwest Canada's mining sectors. Miners of the far north reaches of North America enjoyed a bounty when base metal prices reached record values in 2007, carrying into 2008. The escalation of base metal prices was driven by expanding markets in China and India, as well as a building, retail and technology boom in the West. Mines producing the industrial metals enjoyed unprecedented returns from the ore sh...
Producing mines Thompson Creek Metals Co. operates the Endako Mine, a molybdenum producer for more than 40 years. Located near Fraser Lake in northern British Columbia, Endako includes three open pits, a mill and a roasting facility, and is operated as a joint venture, with Thompson Creek holding a 75 percent interest and Japan-based Sojitz Corp. having the remaining 25 percent. The miner produced 25 million to 26 million pounds of moly in 2008. Due to a sharp drop in molybdenum prices last year, Thompson Creek decided...
Producing mines Early in 2008, Tahera Diamond Corp., owner and operator of Jericho Diamond Mine - Canada's third, and Nunavut's first diamond mine - filed bankruptcy and sought creditor protection. Tahera opened the Jericho in 2006 and recovered and processed 155,000 metric tons (average grade of 0.79 carats per metric ton) during the fourth quarter of 2007, resulting in production of 122,500 carats valued at US$11.6 million, compared with US$8.4 million in the third quarter of 2007. However, financial losses were reported...
Despite the strong price and increasing investment surge for gold, Gold Fields Mineral Services reported in it's Gold Survey 2008 summary that global gold mine production dropped 4 percent in 2008 to reach its lowest level since 1995. Australia, Indonesia and South Africa experienced the most significant declines in production with Mexico and Russia seeing increases in production. South African production plummeted by an estimated 14 percent, the sharpest percentage fall...
Provinces, territories and at least one mining leader are appealing to the Canadian federal government to offer up substantial assistance to the beleaguered industry in its new annual budget due out Jan. 27. The proposals range from various provisions for tax relief to implementing major infrastructure projects aimed at spurring resource development as well as altering monetary policies to ease credit and free up capital for miners nationwide. The reason: Canada, unlike most Western nations, relies heavily on its natural...
Alaska is rich with minerals and considered a safe place to do business. As a result, investment has flowed into the state. Today, a variety of mines and mining projects are scattered across the vast Alaska landscape, from the Greens Creek silver mine and Bokan Mountain uranium project in Southeast Alaska to the world-class Red Dog zinc-lead mine and Northwest Arctic Coal Project in Northwest Alaska; and from the giant Pebble copper-gold-molybdenum project and the Donlin...
Alaska saw robust mining activity in 2008 across the full spectrum of the industry, from small placer operations to major producers, and from exploration programs to advanced development projects. Here is a look at companies reporting significant progress during the year. Placer mining Silverado Gold Mines Ltd. has recovered 26,879 ounces of placer gold from channel and bench deposits in the Nolan Valley through 2007. The largest nugget recovered from the property, located about 280 miles north of Fairbanks, weighed 41.35...
When Greg Beischer and Phil St. George teamed up to form Millrock Resources Inc. nearly two years ago, they set out to make big discoveries that would attract the interest of the world's mining giants. These two exploration geologists now think the Estelle high-grade gold property in Alaska's Rainy Pass district, about 160 kilometers, or 100 miles, northwest of Anchorage could be one such property. The Millrock team has the background to know what global mining companies are...
Though plummeting metals prices and fading investor confidence have hammered the mining sector this year, the Northwest Mining Association's 114th annual meeting in Reno, Nevada, Dec. 1 - 5 drew more than 2,000 attendees, a crowd the yearly gathering has not seen in more than a decade. Miners and others attending the NWMA meeting said the economy and its impact on the mining industry is their primary concern. The meeting's two luncheon speakers echoed that concern in discussin...
As 2008 winds inexorably to a close, I found myself looking for words adequate to describe what will go down in history as one of the most memorable years in many a moon. Words like tumultuous, unpredictable, singular, turbulent, chaotic, confusing, and unsettling hardly do justice to the past year's events. As usual, the mining industry played its small but vital role in the scheme of world events. The first half of the year brought stratospheric commodity prices, while the...
Redfern Resources Ltd. has come up with a new plan for transporting supplies and ore up and down the Taku River between the company's Tulsequah Chief zinc-copper-lead-gold-silver project in British Columbia and the Port of Juneau, about 40 kilometers, or 65 miles away. The new proposal, submitted to the Alaska Department of Natural Resources Nov. 19, outlines the use of shallow draft river tugs, tracked articulated vehicles, modified Morgan Skidders, and several other support...
Geoinformatics Exploration Inc. Dec. 11 said it has satisfied the acquisition conditions required to earn a 100 percent interest in the Whistler Project from Kennecott Exploration Co. by completing the 2008 field season. The agreement allows Kennecott to retain a back-in right to acquire either a 51 percent or 60 percent interest in the project. Whistler is one of the largest groups of contiguous mineral claim blocks held by a single company in Alaska, outside of existing mines and mine development projects. The project...
Pacific North West Capital Corp. has agreed to pay $500,000 to acquire an option to purchase a 100 percent interest in a company that owns the Nixon Fork gold mine. Pacific North West Capital said it paid $100,000 to Mystery Creek Resources Inc., an Alaska subsidiary of St Andrews Goldfields Ltd. upon signing a letter of agreement to the transaction. The Vancouver, B.C.-based junior has until Feb. 15 to exercise the option. A payment of $100,000 is required on closing of the...
Let me start this month's mining update by saying I am not a chartist nor do I believe economic cycles are controlled by cosmic forces known only to the mystics. That said, I do believe in cycles because I have lived and worked through more cycles in the mining industry than I care to remember. So a couple of observations seem in order as we plummet down the slope off another peak into what looks to be a pretty deep, chilly valley. First off, what goes up, must come down with...
Alaska's mineral industry set a new spending record of about $4 billion in 2007, up 13.3 percent from the value of the industry's expenditures in 2006, according to an 89-page report released Nov. 5 by the Division of Geological & Geophysical Surveys and the Office of Economic Development. The industry's reported value, according to DGGS, is calculated by combining the amount spent on exploration and development with the production value of mines in Alaska. While 2007 was a...
ANDREW PROJECT, Yukon Territory - If Australia-based Overland Resources gets its way, this remote valley in eastern Yukon may become home to the next lead-zinc mine in the Far North. And if development plans currently being discussed by the aggressive junior come to fruition, the Port of Skagway could provide facilities for loading the mine's metal concentrates onto oceangoing barges bound for Asia. Overland has set its sights on defining and developing a growing base metal resource that began with discovery of the Andrew...
The Northwest Transmission Line along Highway 37 is once again on the front burner in British Columbia, and development of the 517-kilometer-long, or 321-mile-long, power line could provide easier access to Lower 48 markets for power generated in Alaska. British Columbia has resumed the environmental assessment process and First Nations consultation required for the project, following an announcement by the Canadian province's Premier Gordon Campbell Sept. 26 that the power project was back on track. The B.C. government...
The national sucking sound of venture capital exiting the mining industry has now expanded to a worldwide sucking sound as virtually all of the world's economies fight the massive, unprecedented credit crunch which started in the U.S. The mining industry is certainly not alone in feeling the down turn but its effects in Alaska began to be felt last month and continued this month as projects were shortened, plans down-sized or programs cancelled, all in an effort to preserve...
