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 110
Gold dominates Alaska mineral exploration, but a critical shift arises. Since the discovery of gold in what is now the Alaska capital city of Juneau, prospectors, geologists, and fortune seekers have spent more than 140 consecutive summer seasons exploring The Last Frontier's golden potential. With these endeavors turning up rich aurum lodes in every corner of the state, except for the oil-rich North Slope, the nearly century-and-a-half tradition of seeking and discovering wor...
The increasing number of electric vehicles charged with renewable energy, connected to 5G networks, and boasting the computing power of 200 laptops to autonomously traverse global highways is creating a meteoric rise in demand for the minerals and metals critical to clean energy and high-tech. Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, the foremost authority on lithium battery supply chains, estimates that more than 300 new mines will need to come online by 2035 – just to produce the c...
Mining activity in Northwest Territories held steady in 2022 despite constraints imposed by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic as a cadre of mainly junior mining companies took up the international challenge to seek out large deposits of critical minerals. Early in the year, government officials noted that industry interest in diamonds, gold, and especially critical minerals boded well for the NWT economy in the coming year. "An exciting new chapter is emerging for mining in the...
Start with the biggest deposit of gold ever reported, add in a dash of remote, inaccessible jungles of Indonesia, and let simmer for almost a decade, and you have a recipe for the largest mining-related scandal in modern history, resulting in the system of standardization regarding mineral reporting for the last twenty years and ideally for many more years to come. It is easy to forget that the systems by which mining companies in Canada report and display information...
Replacing this oft-maligned lithium-ion battery metal comes at a cost Traditionally a headline-grabbing metal due to the perceived human rights and monetary costs it adds to lithium-ion batteries and the electric vehicles they power, cobalt is being overshadowed by the enormous demand and price increases for the lithium and nickel that also go into the storage cells that deliver the "E" to the EV revolution. Cobalt, however, continues to be a vital ingredient that improves...
Sixty North Gold Mining Ltd. reported July 11 that crews moved onto its Mon Gold property in late June and began mapping and sampling a recent nickel and cobalt discovery situated about a mile (1.5 kilometers) southeast of the mine site. The original discovery of the critical metals occurred in 2021 when a grab sample returned greater than 1% nickel, 0.18% cobalt, and 0.429 grams per metric ton gold. Follow-up grab samples in early 2022 confirmed 0.31% nickel, 0.022% cobalt,...
It all began in 1991, when geologists Charles E. Fipke and Stewart Blusson found 81 small diamonds at Lac de Gras in Northwest Territories, Canada, marking the first diamond pipe discovery in North America. While this groundbreaking discovery is often synonymous with the name Chuck Fipke – as it was the culmination of his relentless pursuit of elusive diamond indicator minerals for hundreds of kilometers from the Mackenzie River Valley eastward to their source near Lac de G...
Rare earths from the Nechalacho Mine being delivered into the supply chain marks the opening of a new critical minerals chapter in the story of mining in Northwest Territories – a saga that includes a 1930s gold rush to the territory's capital, a whole new town to support the Pine Point zinc mine, and the unlikely discovery of world-class diamond deposits in the famed Lac de Gras region. "We have an opportunity to add to our rich and long-standing mining story," Northwest Terr...
Fortune Minerals Ltd. April 20 reported that its 2021 drilling cut strong cobalt-gold-bismuth mineralization in the Peanut Lake zone on its Nico project in Canada's Northwest Territories. Nico hosts 33.1 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 0.11% (82 million pounds) cobalt, 0.14% (110 million lb) bismuth, 0.04% (27 million lb) copper, and 1.03 grams per metric ton (1.1 million ounces) gold. Peanut Lake is a strong magnetic anomaly about 2,000 meters...
Mineral exploration activity in Northwest Territories showed signs of revival in 2021, coming on the heels of the slowest year in recent memory. Excited by renewed interest in gold deposits in and around the capital city of Yellowknife and other hot spots after the pandemic-related restrictions of 2020, juniors joined longtime explorers Nighthawk Gold Corp. and Gold Terra Resource Corp. (formerly TerraX Minerals) in hunting for the yellow metal across the 1.14...
Home of the famed golden beaches of Nome that has captured the imagination of millions over the past 120 years, the Bering Straits Native Corporation (BSNC) region covers the Seward Peninsula and coastal lands arcing around the eastern and southern coast of the Norton Sound in the far western reaches of Alaska. While this region may be 300 miles beyond North America's highway system, it has served as a crossroads for human activity for at least 15 millennia and will continue...
With such incredible technologies at mankind's disposal today, it is easily forgotten the ingenuity and sheer gumption that our predecessors brought to solving some of the more rigorous and demanding jobs that construed early development. The ever-present wheel, hand tools, weaponry, and beyond, the plethora of devices humanity has created, only expanded into breathtaking and mind-numbing concepts our forebearers could never fathom. Areas such as animal husbandry, agriculture,...
Fortune Minerals Ltd. Sept. 23 announced the start of a 3,000-meter resource expansion and exploration drill program at its Nico cobalt-copper-bismuth-gold project in Canada's Northwest Territories. Nico hosts 33.1 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 0.11% (82 million pounds) cobalt, 0.14% (110 million lb) bismuth, 0.04% (27 million lb) copper, and 1.03 grams per metric ton (1.1 million ounces) gold. This unique mix of critical, precious, and base met...
The envisioned green future where every North American is driving a battery-powered electric vehicle charged with renewable energy could be undermined by cobalt, a somewhat scarce and controversial metal that makes lithium-ion batteries better. "Cobalt is considered the highest material supply chain risk for electric vehicles in the short and medium term," the U.S. Department of Energy penned in an April report. This risk has automakers, lithium-ion battery manufacturers, and...
Far to the north lies the second largest of Canada's three territories, simply named the Northwest Territories, and within this vast region of more than 400,000 square miles lies its only city, the capital called Yellowknife. Yellowknife, and most of the region of the Northwest Territories, lies within what is known as the Canadian Shield, a large area of Precambrian igneous and metamorphic rock, meaning it dates to the earliest part of Earth's history. Scoured down to stone...
Fortune Minerals Ltd. March 17 reported that geophysics carried out last fall has identified five high-priority drill targets for this summer's drill program at the company's Nico gold-cobalt-bismuth-copper deposit in Canada's Northwest Territories. Nico hosts 33.1 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 0.11% (82 million pounds) cobalt, 0.14% (110 million lb) bismuth, 0.04% (27 million lb) copper and 1.03 grams per metric ton (1.1 million ounces) gold....
Nighthawk Gold Corp. March 11 reported that the Tlicho Road connecting the community of Whati, Northwest Territories to Highway 3 remains on pace to be completed this fall. Being constructed along an existing winter route, the Tlicho Road will bring all-season access 97 kilometers (60 miles) closer to Nighthawks Indin Lake gold property, which lies about 160 kilometers (100 miles) northeast of Whati. The construction of this road into mineral-rich areas is being funded...
For many mining companies eyeing prospects in Canada's far north, 2020 presented insurmountable challenges. But for the few explorers and producers focused on Northwest Territories, the year proved to be quite productive, even as a global coronavirus pandemic added expensive restrictions to already costly campaigns. Rigorous restrictions imposed by local and federal officials to quell potential outbreaks of the disease at mining camps and prevent its spread to local...
As 2020, arguably the most calamitous year for northern mining in decades, drew to a close, the Government of Northwest Territories took the unusual step of topping up its annual mining incentives program with an additional C$100,000. In August, the territorial government awarded C$1 million in these grants to 19 junior mining companies and prospectors who proposed mineral exploration programs during the 2020-2021 field season. Normally awarded in the spring, the incentives...
More than six years after turning its attention to advancing to production the world-class mineral reserves of its Nico project in Northwest Territories, Fortune Minerals Ltd. is again putting boots on the ground in search of new mineralization near the Nico deposit located 160 kilometers (99 miles) northwest of Yellowknife. The tenacious junior reported Sept. 2 that an exploration program planned for the 2020 field season is underway, despite restraints imposed by the...
Fortune Minerals Ltd. Sept. 3 announced the start of a geophysical program to further delineate expansion drill targets east of the company's Nico gold-cobalt-bismuth-copper deposit in Canada's Northwest Territories. Nico currently hosts 33.1 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 0.11% (82 million pounds) cobalt, 0.14% (110 million lb) bismuth, 0.04% (27 million lb) copper and 1.03 grams per metric ton (1.1 million ounces) gold. Fortune has evidence...
Fortune Minerals Ltd. Aug. 10 announced it is gearing up for an exploration program focused on gold targets on its Nico cobalt-gold-bismuth-copper project in Northwest Territories. A 2014 feasibility study for Nico detailed plans for a 4,650-metric-ton-per-day operation that would produce an average of 1,615 metric tons of battery-grade cobalt; 41,300 ounces of gold; 1,750 metric tons of bismuth; and 265 metric tons of copper annually over a 20-year mine life. This feasibility...
Resumption of construction of the Tlicho all-season road is good news for Colomac and Nico, two mineral exploration projects in Canada's Northwest Territories. The Tlicho Road is being constructed along an existing winter route that connects the community of Whati to Highway 3, which is roughly 97 kilometers (60 miles) to the south. Construction of the road got under way last September, but activities were halted due to COVID-19 but ramped back up in mid-May. Nighthawk Gold...
As the largest shareholder and chairman of Novagold Resources Inc., a company that owns 50% of the 39-million-ounce Donlin Gold project in Alaska, it is natural for New York billionaire Thomas Kaplan to elucidate potential investors on his predictions of coming rises in the price for an ounce of gold. The truth, however, is the renowned entrepreneur and natural resources investor is not bullish on gold because he has skin in the game. Instead, he is a major owner of the...
Fortune Minerals Ltd. May 7 announced that it continues to make progress on a new mine plan for its Nico cobalt-gold-bismuth-copper project in Northwest Territories during the coronavirus pandemic. The company said it is complying with government COVID-19 protocols, including temporary closure of its head office in Ontario, prohibiting non-essential travel and social distancing. Working from home, Fortune employees, with some assistance from engineering consultants, continue...
