The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
Venture's partners set spending for '08 to advance giant copper-gold-molybdenum deposit in Southwest Alaska toward development
The Pebble Limited Partnership- an Alaska-based 50-50 partnership formed between a wholly owned subsidiary of Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. and a wholly owned U.S. subsidiary of Anglo American plc to engineer, permit, construct and operate a modern, long-life mine at the Pebble Project-has set a 2008 budget of $140.1 million to advance the Pebble copper-gold-molybdenum project in southwest Alaska.
In early April the partners appointed John Shively as the partnership's first CEO.
Shively brings vast experience working in both Alaska's public and private sectors. His resume includes: serving as commissioner of the Alaska Department of Natural Resources under former Gov. Tony Knowles, chief of staff for former Gov. Bill Sheffield and currently, president of the Resource Development Council for Alaska, Inc.
Shively also played a key role with NANA Inc., the Native regional corporation of Northwest Alaska, in its efforts to acquire and develop Alaska's Red Dog zinc mine in partnership with Teck Cominco Ltd. He was awarded the prestigious Denali Award by the Alaska Federation of Natives in 1992 for his contributions to the Native community.
The first order of business for Shively is to appoint a senior management team for the Pebble Partnership. He also will manage the $140.1 million to be spent this year on programs approved by the Pebble Partnership Board.
The approved budget includes $61.6 million to drill about 157,000 feet at Pebble, focusing on upgrading resources at Pebble East to the indicated category, which will help with completing a pre-feasibility study now under way. Step-out drilling also will be conducted to determine the extent of the deposit. Six rigs have already drilled 22,500 feet since the 2008 site program began in February.
The board also approved $30.2 million to be spent on engineering work to support completion of the pre-feasibility study. The money will be spent on detailed metallurgical testing and infrastructure studies.
Another $24.9 million is earmarked for an environmental study program for the Pebble project. This is in addition to $87 million previously spent on environmental and socio-economic studies at Pebble and will be used to complete the Environmental Baseline Document for the project. This document is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2009 and will be used to evaluate various mine design alternatives in advance of the development of the final mine plan for Pebble, the partnership said.
The remaining $14.8 million will be spent on a community engagement and public affairs program. Shively will use these funds to continue stakeholder relationships, educate the public and gain project support, the partnership said.
Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.
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