The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Sorted by date Results 751 - 775 of 3020
Graphite One Resources Inc. May 17 announced that it has received a report from the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority that assess potential locations for a facility to refine graphite from its Graphite Creek deposit in western Alaska into advanced-materials such as coated spherical graphite used as an anode in lithium-ion batteries. In its report, AIDEA identified Homer, Kenai, Port Mackenzie and Seward as potential Alaska-based sites for the graphite...
Exploration companies familiar with Alaska already know the Far North State is great place to look for critical minerals such as rare earth elements, platinum group metals, cobalt and tin. A new report published by the U.S. Geological Survey, however, indicates that Alaska may be richer in these and other minerals vital to the United States than previously realized. Working alongside the Alaska Division of Geological & Geophysical Surveys, USGS developed a new geospatial tool...
Mining's contribution to Alaska's economy starts with the hefty paychecks being issued to the some 4,350 miners that work in the state, according to recent study completed by the Alaska Miners Association and McDowell Group. The report, "The economic benefits of Alaska's mining industry," found that the average miner working in Alaska during 2016 received a whopping US$108,000 for the year, about double the average income across all sectors in the state. That is nearly US$470...
After six tumultuous years, 2017 is shaping up to be a turnaround year for the enormous Pebble copper-gold-molybdenum project in Southwest Alaska. "The stars that were previously askew, they seem to be lining up," Northern Dynasty CEO Ron Thiessen told Mining News. This star realignment is reflected in a US$37.4 million financing the Pebble project owner closed on Jan. 26. Underwritten by a trio of renowned financiers, this financing involved the issuance of 20.24 million shar...
Despite protests by Alaska miners and government, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has pushed ahead with a management plan that will place roughly 74 percent of BLM-administered lands in Alaska’s Eastern Interior region off limits to mining for decades to come. BLM is responsible for the management of 6.5 million acres in the federal government’s Eastern Interior planning area, a roughly 30-million-acre, triangle-shaped expanse of eastern Alaska that stretches from the Yuk...
With C$2.5 million in the bank and roughly two dozen mineral exploration projects it has generated in Alaska, British Columbia, New Mexico and Mexico, Millrock Resources Inc. is prepared for a stellar 2017 as metals prices rise and a bullish sentiment returns to mining markets. "While we will not under-estimate the work ahead, we continue to carry forward into 2017 with a spirit of optimism," Millrock President and CEO Greg Beischer said. "The cycle seems to have changed, and...
After eight years of increasing federal regulations, United States miners are encouraged that President Donald Trump, Congress and the American people have formed a trifecta that will support policies aimed at streamline permitting and encourage growth in the mining sector. A poll conducted for NMA earlier this month indicates that the U.S. mining sector and the American populace at large have similar priorities for the Trump administration and 115th Congress. "When they cast...
According to the United States Geological Survey’s annual report, “Mineral Commodity Summaries 2017,” the value of non-fuel minerals produced in the United States and Alaska during 2016 remained at similar levels to 2015. Alaska mines produced roughly US$3.09 billion worth of minerals, excluding petroleum and coal, marking the seventh year straight that output from Alaska mines have topped US$3 billion. Gold and zinc account for roughly 80 percent of Alaska’s mineral productio...
Miranda Gold Corp. and Gold Torrent Inc. have their sights set on opening a high-grade gold mine at the historic Willow Creek property in the Hatcher Pass region of Southcentral Alaska by the end of 2018. Only about 75 miles north of Anchorage, this 8,700-acre property blankets a large portion of the Willow Creek mining district, including the pre-World War II Lucky Shot and War Baby mines. It is estimated that from 1918 until being shut down by the federal War Production Boar...
With the signing of a presidential order that begins the process of undoing the Waters of the United States rule, President Donald Trump continues to make good on his promise to roll back regulations that are stifling economic development. “The EPA’s so-called ‘Waters of the United States’ rule is one of the worst examples of federal regulation, and it has truly run amok,” Trump said during the Feb. 28 signing of the order. The executive call to dismantle WOTUS was hailed as...
Alaska fell from favor with the 350 mining executives who responded to the Fraser Institute’s Survey of Mining Companies 2016, published on Feb. 28. This group of miners, explorers and consultants ranked the Far North State as the 14th best jurisdiction on Earth to seek and develop a mine. To gather information for its report, the Fraser Institute asks mining executives to rank the mineral potential and mining policies of mining jurisdictions around the globe. The C...
A Swiss investment fund with ties to Russia-born billionaire Vladimir Iorich has put in a bid to buy the shuttered Mountain Pass rare earth element mine in California, raising red flags for U.S. lawmakers concerned about the United States’ dependence on foreign countries for REEs and other metals necessary to maintain the U.S. military’s high-tech arsenal. To help promote domestic production of these strategic metals and block foreign firms from buying rare earth mines on U.S....
The path to discovering the viability of developing a mine at Arctic and the road needed to deliver the copper, zinc, lead, gold and silver from this exceptionally high-grade Northwest Alaska deposit to world markets are both making headway in 2017. Arctic is the most advanced of the high-grade deposits that make up the Upper Kobuk Mineral Projects, an extensive land package that unites Trilogy Metals Inc.-controlled mining claims that blanket a 70-mile- (110 kilometer) long...
With the opening late last month of a public comment period for the environmental impact statement on the proposed Ambler Mining District Industrial Access Project, I am cautiously optimistic that this time, Sisyphus will get the boulder up the hill. As a lowly graduate student at the University of Alaska Fairbanks back in 1979, I helped a crew from Anaconda Minerals color township-size blocks on a huge paper map of the Brooks Range. At the time, Anaconda and numerous other...
South32 Ltd., a coal and base metals miner spun out of BHP Billiton in 2015, has cut a US$150 million deal with Trilogy Metals Inc. to earn up to a 50 percent interest in the Upper Kobuk Mineral Projects, UKMP, a large land package that blankets most of the Ambler Mining District in Northwest Alaska. South32, which up to this point was focused on the Southern Hemisphere, has eight mines in Australia, Africa and South America that produce aluminum, coal, manganese, nickel and...
After roughly two years of taxing negotiations, Teck Alaska and Northwest Arctic Borough have found middle ground on a tax structure that offers the municipality added funds to provide services to a sprawling remote borough without risking the viability of Red Dog during the lows of cyclical metals markets. Teck is the operator of Red Dog and Northwest Arctic Borough is a regional municipality that blankets 40,750 square miles of Northwest Alaska, a minerals rich expanse...
There are good indications that large porphyry copper deposits may be found beyond the borders of the Pebble property held by Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. Quaterra Resources Inc. has cut a deal on Groundhog, one of the most promising of these prospects in this area of Southwest Alaska known for its world-class copper potential. “The Groundhog project offers the potential to discover a major deposit in an established porphyry belt,” said Quaterra Chairman and CEO Tom Pat...
Five miners lost their lives while working alone at mines in the United States during the first quarter of 2017, prompting the U.S. Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration to launch a campaign to raise awareness of the dangers miners may face when working in isolation. There were eight mining fatalities in the U.S. during the first three months of this year, five of which were miners who were working alone. MSHA began to become concerned about these u...
Following up on its success in 2016, Redstar Gold Corp. has gotten off to an early start on expanding the high-grade gold zones at its Unga project in Southwest Alaska. The nearly 60,000-acre Unga property blankets two high-grade gold trends – Apollo-Sitka and Shumagin – that each cut roughly six miles across Unga Island. Apollo-Sitka hosts Apollo, a historic mine that produced roughly 150,000 ounces of gold from 1892 to 1913. Shumagin, a parallel structural trend about 2,000...
Sparked by the discovery of the White Gold district and fueled by investors' appetite for mining stocks, the Yukon experienced a modern era gold rush in 2007 that included nearly C$1 billion of exploration spending during over six years. This frenzied exploration turned up dozens of gold projects across the northern territory and now some of the world's biggest gold miners are cutting deals on the best of the discoveries made. Kinross Gold Corp. was the first of the major...
After five long years of battling inside and outside of the courtroom, Pebble Limited Partnership and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency have negotiated an agreement that opens the door for the enormous Pebble copper-gold-molybdenum project in Southwest Alaska to enter the permitting process unencumbered by predetermined restrictions. “This settlement represents a major step forward for the Pebble project,” said Pebble Partnership CEO Tom Collier. “It allows us to start...
Now that the Pebble Partnership has settled its dispute with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the company is focusing its attention on readying the world-class Pebble copper-gold-molybdenum project for permitting. The first move towards attaining this goal was to assemble an advisory committee that will provide valuable insights from a broad range of perspectives, including those that voiced concerns about building a large mine in the Bristol Bay region of Southwest...
The Government of Yukon May 18 announced that it has approved 21 placer and 38 hard rock projects to receive C$1.6 million in funding through the Yukon Mineral Exploration Program. Designed to promote and enhance mineral prospecting and exploration in the Yukon, YMEP provides up to C$40,000 per year for exploration work aimed at discovering new placer resources or for exploration work aimed at moving a discovery on a claim to an advanced exploration stage; up to C$25,000 a...
Alaska is rich in mineral potential but poor in the critical infrastructure needed to fully realize this potential, that was the message Alaska Division of Geological and Geological Surveys Director Steve Masterman delivered to lawmakers on Capitol Hill. During a March 30 hearing, Masterman informed member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources that Alaska could be the answer to the United States growing dependence on foreign suppliers for minerals....
President Donald Trump is set to ink his signature on a resolution that overturns a midnight hour Obama administration rule that threatened U.S. coal miners with added regulatory burden. The so-called Stream Protection Rule was touted by the Obama administration as a necessary clarification of the rules surrounding valley fill, a mining technique used in Appalachia that involves depositing overburden removed from hilltops in an adjacent valley and then re-contouring the...
