The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
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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...
May 10, 2022, celebrates the ninth annual Alaska Mining Day. Established in 2013, Alaska Mining Day was created through legislation sponsored by Sen. Cathy Giessel, R-Anchorage, "to recognize and honor the intrepid individuals and industry that played an enormous role in settling and developing the territory and the state that continue to contribute to the economy of the state." Why May 10? On this day in 1872, the General Mining Act of the United States was approved – w...
On March 18, 2022, Alaska's mining community lost Bill Ellis, a close friend and geologist that was universally loved for his kind spirit and optimism, traits that will live on as a legacy as solid as the Alaska rocks he explored for the better part of half a century. All of us at North of 60 Mining News were blessed to get to know Bill and wish to send our love and condolences to his family, friends, and colleagues. In honor of Bill's memory, we would like to republish "Bill...
When Vital Metals Ltd. purchased the rights to mine the mineral resources in the upper zones of the Nechalacho rare earth project from Avalon Rare Metals Inc. in 2019, the Australian junior hit the ground running. And the rest is history. Literally. In July, Vital Metals became the first company to produce rare earth minerals in Canada – a country known to host vast undeveloped quantities of this suite of coveted elements. Vital is also only the second company to mine rare e...
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...
"During the two decades preceding and those following World War I, when the United States produced more than half the world's copper, the mines at Kennecott, Alaska were among the nation's largest, and contained the last of the great high grade copper ore deposits discovered in the American West. Just as mining technology was gearing up to exploit the low-grade ores that remained in the West, the Kennecott mines exposed an ore deposit of quality unequaled anywhere in the...
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...
Resolution Minerals Ltd. announced the completion of the first trenching program at Tourmaline Ridge, a gold prospect at the company's 64North project in Alaska's Goodpaster District. Located about 1,000 meters southwest of the Aurora prospect on the West Pogo claim block at 64North, Tourmaline Ridge lies on a trend of mineralization that extends northeast to the Northern Star Resources Ltd.'s Pogo gold mine. Northern Star's Goodpaster discovery, which is currently undergoing...
Throughout the relatively short modern history of Alaska, many nameless and oft unrecognized explorers have contributed to the Last Frontier state in ways that future generations will never be able to truly appreciate. This, however, is not the case for Bill Ellis, an explorer and geologist who has gifted his knowledge and experience for nearly half a century and personifies the attitude needed to succeed in mineral exploration, optimism. As if by providence, Bill was born in...
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...
Reminiscent of America's gilded age, the world is priming itself for a new era of technology and energy centered on the electricity that sparked the imaginations of visionaries such as Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison. This new era, however, sets aside more than a century of burning fossil fuels in favor of new clean sources of the electricity that will power human innovation into the 21st century and beyond. Solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal are but a few of the methods...
From reinstating the Roadless Rule in the Tongass Forest to replacing the General Mining Law of 1872, federal regulations being proposed by President Joe Biden threaten to rain on a parade of strong metals prices, growing demand for critical minerals, and robust investments into mineral exploration and mining across Alaska. "We recommend Congress develop legislation to replace outdated mining laws including the General Mining Law (GML) of 1872 governing locatable minerals...
Like nearly every other aspect of human existence, the COVID-19 pandemic has fundamentally changed the mineral exploration industry in Canada and Alaska. The Association for Mineral Exploration British Columbia embraced this change with the first ever AME Remote Roundup, a virtual rendition of the long-lived mineral exploration convention that traditionally brings thousands of people to Vancouver, British Columbia at the onset of each year. "This is one of the first meeting...
Already headed toward the lowest level of annual mineral exploration spending in nearly two decades, the mining industry in Nunavut got broadsided by the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. Travel and workplace restrictions quickly imposed last spring by federal and local authorities to prevent the spread of the disease to the northern territory led some companies to cancel or postpone planned exploration programs until 2021. In February, Natural Resources Canada released figures...
Due to their vital importance to American manufacturing and the fact that 100% of U.S. supply comes from overseas, primarily China, rare earth elements top the list of minerals and metals deemed critical to the United States. When the U.S. Geological Survey plugged in 52 critical mineral commodities into a recently developed supply risk tool, six rare earth elements – dysprosium (No. 1), yttrium (No. 2), neodymium (No. 3), lanthanum (No. 5), cerium (No. 6) and praseodymium (...
In the few months since taking the helm at Contango ORE Inc., Rick Van Nieuwenhuyse has steered this unconventional mineral exploration company toward being the 30% owner of Alaska's next million-ounce gold producing mine. This coming mine at Contango ORE's Peak Gold deposit quickly surpassed Donlin Gold, Livengood, and other top contenders for Alaska's next large gold operation when Kinross Gold Corp. acquired a 70% interest in the high-grade gold project and unveiled a...
SPARKS, Nev. – The notoriously long timeline for permitting a mine in the United States may soon be shortened. This reprieve is not from the various renditions of mine permit reform that has been introduced to Congress over the past decade but from an agency in Washington D.C. that most people have never heard of – the Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council (FPISC). Alexander Herrgott, executive director of FPISC, drew the nervous laughter he was expecting when he...
As the rest of the country suffers through the Dog Days of summer, Alaska is approaching the end of a topsy-turvy summer season that saw unseasonably hot, dry weather in some parts of the state during some parts of the summer, while other parts of the state have seen record rainfall and unseasonably early snowfall. Gold prices have skyrocketed over the $1,500 per ounce mark and silver prices have moved strongly up, now trading at a one-year high. However, copper and zinc are a...
The Canadian government has dedicated C$2.2 billion to clean up contaminated mine sites in the Yukon and Northwest Territories. The eight projects to be addressed with this investment are the historical Faro, United Keno Hill, Mount Nansen, Ketza River and Clinton Creek mines in the Yukon; and Giant, Cantung and Great Bear Lake mines in the Northwest Territories. This new remediation effort, Northern Abandoned Mine Reclamation Program, was introduced by the Honorable Carolyn...
Thanks to improving gold output and lower costs at its Pogo gold mine in Alaska, Northern Star Resources Ltd. sold 232,042 ounces of gold during the final quarter of its fiscal year 2019, a record for the Australian gold miner. During the three months ending June 30, Northern Star sold 48,009 oz of gold produced at Pogo, which is a 33 percent increase over the previous quarter. The Perth-based miner expects gold output at Pogo to continue its upward trend. "Pogo is on track...
When it comes to attracting mining investment, Alaska, British Columbia and all three Canadian territories rank among the top 20 jurisdictions in the world on the Fraser Institute Survey of Mining Companies 2018. This report asks industry professionals from around the globe to score mining jurisdictions based on their mineral endowment and various policy topics important to mining. "The mining survey-now in its 21st year-is the most comprehensive report card on government...
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...
Roughly six years after applications to federal authorities, Barrick Gold Corp. and Novagold Resources Inc. have crossed the finish line on gaining the key federal permits needed to build a mine at their 39-million-ounce Donlin Gold Mine project in Southwest Alaska. This major permitting milestone was reached on Aug. 13, when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Land Management issued a joint record of decision for Donlin Gold, marking the completion of a...
The Bornite deposit at Trilogy Metal Inc.'s Upper Kobuk Mineral Projects in Northwest Alaska contains 77 million pounds of cobalt, according to a maiden resource estimate published by the company on June 5. This significant cobalt resource, among the largest in North America, is a by-product to the roughly 6.4 billion lb of copper that has been outlined so far at this world-class deposit in the Ambler Mining District. Trilogy Metals anticipates that a US$10 million...
Great American Minerals Exploration Inc. is investing roughly US$10 million on exploration this year at its 55,465-acre SAM gold project about 45 miles west of the Pogo Mine. Having staked its first claims in at the SAM project area in 1999, GAME, as the privately held exploration company is commonly known, is no stranger to this emerging gold-rich stretch of the Tintina Gold Belt between the Pogo and Fort Knox mines. GAME's previous land position, however, covered only a...
