2012 – Page 33 – Republic of Mining

Striking South African miners killed at Canadian coal mine: reports – by Geoffrey York (Globe and Mail – November 1, 2012)

November 1, 2012

Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

JOHANNESBURG — Two striking miners have been killed by security guards at a Toronto-based company’s coal mine in South Africa, local reports say.

The deaths, confirmed by the company Thursday, are the latest in a year of sporadic violence that has killed more than 60 people at mines across South Africa, including 34 who were killed by police at the Marikana platinum mine in August.

In the clash on Wednesday, about 100 striking workers tried to storm a locked mine-explosives armoury at a coal mine owned by Toronto-based Forbes & Manhattan Coal, but were dispersed by security guards, police said.

“It is further alleged that the security officers chased some of the workers into an informal settlement near the mine and shots were fired, injuring two men,” police spokesman Colonel Jay Naicker said in a statement.

He said the two men died from their injuries in hospital, and police are investigating two counts of murder. The company confirmed Thursday that two of its employees were killed in the clash.

The company said it has suspended operations at its Magdalena and Aviemore underground coal mines in South Africa, where strikes have been continuing since Oct. 17.

Ontario Mining moves into Queen’s Park for a day

November 1, 2012

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

The message that modern mining is a significant contributor to Ontario’s economy and society and a helpful partner in improving the province’s financial condition was well received at Queen’s Park. On Tuesday, October 30, the Ontario Mining Association and its member companies held their annual Meet the Miners event in the Legislature.

Although Ontario’s seat of government is a major international mining finance and services centre, this strength of the provincial economy is sometimes lost amidst the other activities in the city and the visible absence of mine headframes. It is important for the industry to constructively show its presence and its attributes from time to time in the province’s main political arena.

And the message is getting through. Mining has earned mention in recent provincial budgets and throne speeches and is gaining a larger presence in the business and mainstream media. CBC Radio recently included mining in a segment of the series “Toronto Juggernauts,” which featured strong and integral parts of the city’s economy.

There were several components to Meet the Miners Day this year. While the remnants of tropical storm Sandy may have left some mining participants awash with their travel plans and the prorogation of the Legislature found some MPPs in their home ridings, the participation rate was extremely high.

Athabasca Oil foreign joint venture hits roadblock – by Nathan VAnderklippe and Jacquie McNish (Globe and Mail – November 1, 2012)

November 1, 2012

Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

CALGARY AND TORONTO — Athabasca Oil Corp. faces new obstacles in completing a long-promised multibillion-dollar joint venture with partners from Kuwait and Spain, months after it said such a deal was imminent.

The company has said it is merely awaiting government approval to allow one of its buyers to sign the transaction, which markets expect to be worth roughly $2-billion. In August, Ali al-Sammak, Kuwait’s ambassador to Canada, confirmed that senior Kuwait Petroleum Corp. officials had signed a memorandum of understanding, with a final agreement expected in October, toward buying an interest in two Athabasca properties in Alberta.

However, that agreement has yet to be finalized, and people close to the deal say part of the delay stems from difficulties with one of the buyers. Kuwait is not the only acquirer: Spanish company Repsol YPF SA is also involved.

The trouble landing a major foreign joint venture comes during a moment of broader uncertainty for a Canadian energy sector increasingly reliant on overseas capital. Two major transactions – deals to buy Progress Energy Resources Corp. and Nexen Inc., worth over $20-billion in aggregate – remain in limbo as Ottawa scrambles to compile new foreign investment guidelines.

The Chinese are coming, the Chinese are coming – by Margaret Wente (Globe and Mail – November 1, 2012)

November 1, 2012

Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

It’s a scary time in Canada these days, and not because of Halloween. A mysterious new investment treaty with China has people spooked. On top of that, the government is about to decide whether CNOOC, a Chinese state-owned oil company, can plant its big red boots in our oil patch. Watch out! We’re signing our sovereignty away. Before you can say boo, the rapacious foreigners will turn us into global coolies.

Does all of this seem eerily familiar? Why, yes. Good old-fashioned Canadian nationalism has come back to haunt us. Back in the 1980s, the people who fought the trade deal with the U.S. said the very same things about the Americans. It didn’t turn out that way, of course. Free trade made us prosperous and rich.

There’s a load of irony in all this. The people who used to be anti-American and pro-Chinese seem to have changed sides. But now that Barack Obama is in office (for the moment, at any rate), anti-Americanism isn’t quite as fashionable as it used to be. The Chinese are now the bad guys. And the more they act like capitalists, the more they’re demonized for being Communists. “We’re not dealing on an even playing field with Communist China,” the NDP’s Thomas Mulcair warns. “Why in heaven’s name would we give up our own resources that way to another country?” The one thing that never goes out of fashion in this country is moral superiority.

The disappointing truth about this investment deal is that it’s an incremental step ahead. It won’t allow the Chinese to rampage through the land.

Oil producers eye Arctic backup plan as pipelines face uncertain future – by Claudia Cattaneo (National Post – November 1, 2012)

November 1, 2012

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

Oil producers worried about pipeline bottlenecks and the future of proposed pipelines to the U.S. Gulf Coast and Canada’s West Coast are taking a serious look at an Arctic backup — the Port of Churchill in northern Manitoba — to get their oil to tidal water.

Discussions are quietly underway between Calgary’s oil community, Canada’s only Arctic seaport, railway companies, and refiners on the East Coast and the Gulf Coast, as well as in Europe, to collect unrefined oil by rail from fields across Western Canada, get it to the port on the west coast of Hudson Bay and load it on Panamax-class tankers.

“We think we can provide them with a competitive cost advantage to position [oil] to multiple destinations for a short period of time each year,” said Jeff McEachern, the Winnipeg-based executive director of Churchill Gateway Development Corp. who has been making frequent trips to Calgary during the past six months to fine-tune the strategy.

“We are in pretty close proximity to where the oil is being produced to get it to tidal water. It’s not a full solution, but it has an economic advantage to it and a producer is always looking for any economic advantage they can get.”

The deep-water port is motivated to make it work. It has been a major export point for Western Canadian grain since 1929, but it’s looking to diversify its customer base following this year’s dismantling of the Canadian Wheat Board, its dominant customer.

McGuinty’s dark secrets on cancelled power plants revealed – by Terence Corcoran (National Post – November 1, 2012)

November 3, 2012November 1, 2012

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

Documents show cancelling Oakville plant alone will cost $1-billion

As Premier Dalton McGuinty prorogued the Ontario legislature and announced his retirement last month, he would have known that some of the darker secrets of his government’s handling of energy policy would soon come to light. Today, those secrets — until now buried in 56,000 pages of released but unreadable documents — are appearing in the open.

In sordid and alarming detail, the documents show that the McGuinty government’s cancellation of gas plants in Oakville and Mississauga are likely to cost as much as $1.3-billion, possibly more. Killing the Oakville plant and moving it to Bath will alone burden Ontario ratepayers and taxpayers with costs that exceed $1-billion.

These numbers — openly discussed in documents as part of the government’s legal negotiations with TransCanada Energy and other companies — are a far cry from the $40-million Energy Minister Chris Bentley recently announced as the cost of killing the 900-megawatt Oakville Generating Station.

More than the numbers, the documents — analyzed by Toronto energy consultant Tom Adams in a posting to his website Tuesday and in FP Comment Thursday — also show that the premier’s office played a role in the gas-plant debacle. Under instruction, bureaucrats and government agency staff, especially at the Ontario Power Authority (OPA), were also dragged into litigation negotiations aimed at containing the major liabilities the government had created.

[Northern Ontario] ONR sale concerns resource companies – by CBC Radio Sudbury (October 31, 2012)

November 1, 2012

http://www.cbc.ca/sudbury/

Georgia Pacific and Detour Gold say they rely on stable freight service

Companies who move their products by rail say they are watching the Ontario Northland divestment closely. The Ontario Northland Railway hauls freight for a number of industrial operations in communities along Highway 11.

The future of what is now the ONR is doubly important for the town of Englehart. The railway is a major employer, as is Georgia Pacific — a company that uses the ONR to ship oriented strand board from its Englehart plant.

“We’ve engaged in conversations with the Ontario Ministry of Northern Development and Mines,” said Georgia Pacific spokesperson Eric Abercrombie.

“We have expressed to them that any change in the ownership of the Northland Railroad would need to continue providing … consistent reliable service level.”

The Atlanta-based company has had “a great relationship with the Ontario Northland Railroad,” Abercrombie said, adding that the Englehart plant “depends on quality rail service that is … safe, reliable and competitive so we [can] continue delivering products to our customers.”

Glencore offers to end Nyrstar deal to land Xstrata – by Foo Yun Chee (Mineweb.com – November 1, 2012)

November 1, 2012

http://www.mineweb.com/

A source close to the deal says Glencore is prepared to end an exclusive zinc sales deal and sell its minority stake in Nyrstar to win EU approval for its $33 billion takeover of Xstrata.

BRUSSELS (REUTERS) – Commodities trader Glencore has offered to end an exclusive zinc sales deal and sell its minority stake in world No. 1 producer Nyrstar to win EU approval for its $33 billion takeover of Xstrata, a source said on Wednesday.

The European Commission – which is examining the merger, one of the largest in the sector to date – is concerned the deal will hand the group an excessive slice of the northern European zinc market, the person familiar with the matter said.

Analysts estimate a combined Glencore-Xstrata, which would be the world’s largest zinc miner, would have 50 percent of the European zinc metal market. Ending Glencore’s agreement with Nyrstar would free up 350,000 tonnes, the person said.

The person said Glencore, the single largest shareholder in Nyrstar, was also willing to sell its stake of just under 8 percent in the company. The EU competition authorities will decide whether the offer is sufficient to allay regulatory worries or more is required.

[Sudbury] Vale exec [John Pollesel] ousted – – by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – Novemeber 1, 2012)

November 1, 2012

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

Vale’s corporate spokesman denied 10 days ago that John Pollesel’s head was on the chopping block. But then, on Wednesday, the company confirmed the role of the Sudbury-born director of Vale’s Base Metals North Atlantic Operations was “no longer required.”

Vale spokesman Cory McPhee told The Star on Oct. 21 there was no truth to a widely circulating rumour that Pollesel was being cut by the company.

Wednesday, Vale’s Sudbury spokeswoman, Angie Robson, said base metals at Vale “is in the process of a business-wide review to address some significant short-term challenges.

“Part of that effort involves reshaping and restructuring the business to position ourselves for long-term success and sustainability,” she said.

Vale’s parent company, Vale SA, has said of late, it is determined to ensure all operations are self-sustaining, prompting decisions such as winding down production at the 100-year-old Frood Mine.

Four greats to enter Canadian Mining Hall of Fame – by Northern Miner (October 29 – November 04, 2012)

October 31, 2012

The Northern Miner, first published in 1915, during the Cobalt Silver Rush, is considered Canada’s leading authority on the mining industry.

The Canadian Mining Hall of Fame will welcome four new inductees at its twenty-fifth annual induction dinner on Jan. 10, 2013, at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel in Toronto. The new inductees are Charles E. Fipke, Gerald W. Grandey, Pierre Lassonde and James C. O’Rourke. The Northern Miner is a sponsor of the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame. For tickets and more information, visit www.mininghalloffame.ca.

Geologists and prospectors had searched for diamond deposits in North America for more than a century with only teasing hints of success until discovering a cluster of kimberlites in the Northwest Territories that became Ekati, Canada’s first diamond mine. This groundbreaking discovery, synonymous with the name “Charles E. (Chuck) Fipke,” was the culmination of Fipke’s relentless pursuit of elusive diamond indicator minerals for hundreds of kilometres from the Mackenzie River Valley eastward to their source near Lac de Gras. Other key contributors in his quest were his associate, geologist Stewart Blusson, economic geologist Hugo Dummett and University of Cape Town professor John Gurney. The discovery’s epic success — achieved on a shoestring budget through innovative science — sparked a staking rush, inspired other discoveries and created a new industry for Canada.

Born in Edmonton, Alta., Fipke earned a B.Sc. degree in geology from the University of British Columbia (UBC) in 1970. His adventurous nature took him to Papua New Guinea, South Africa, Brazil and other exotic locales, where he worked for senior companies such as Kennecott and Cominco, and became intrigued with the use of heavy mineral geochemistry as an exploration tool.

[B.C. coal] Miners Could Have Been Trained Here Easily – by Bill Tieleman (The Tyee.ca – October 29, 2012)

October 31, 2012

http://thetyee.ca/

Longwall coal mining is hardly the rare, elite skill politicians want us to believe. If you don’t think Chinese miners should be coming to British Columbia as temporary foreign workers in new coal mines, get ready to be really angry.

That’s because the federal Conservative government will ratify a foreign investment agreement this week, ensuring even more Chinese takeovers of Canada’s natural resources — and jobs.

And if you doubt that China-owned coal companies had no choice but to import their own workers to B.C. because no trained, experienced miners are available, prepare to get downright furious.

The reason is simple. Neither the coal companies nor the federal or B.C. governments wanted to train Canadian workers — even though it’s nowhere near as hard as they claim.

“We require temporary foreign workers because we are introducing a highly mechanized form of longwall mining to the province. There’s currently no active long-wall mining going on in Canada or B.C.,” says Jody Shimkus, vice-president of HD Mining International, one of the companies involved in developing up to four coal mines.

Potash Corp appeals to Israel to allow deal for rival – by Steven Scheer (Reuters Canada – October 31, 2012)

October 31, 2012

http://ca.reuters.com/

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Potash Corp, the world’s No. 1 fertilizer maker, is ramping up efforts to buy Israel Chemicals Ltd, appealing directly to Israel’s prime minister to back a deal that would rank as the largest foreign takeover of an Israeli company.

Conglomerate Israel Corp, which owns a majority in ICL, said that Potash Chief Executive Bill Doyle has met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to push for a deal, while financial daily Calcalist said Netanyahu has instructed his staff and the finance ministry to examine it.

Potash Corp confirmed on Wednesday it has met with Israeli government officials, and Israel Corp said it was aware of the meetings.

“The company confirms it is aware that Canada’s Potash is in talks with various government agencies that included a meeting with the prime minister regarding examining the possibility of merging ICL with Potash,” Israel Corp said in a statement.

Israel Corp officials declined to comment further. The finance ministry said it had not received any formal request. Potash Corp already has a 13.84 percent stake in ICL, the world’s sixth-largest fertilizer producer. It made its initial investment in 1998.

Canada economy shrinks in August, clouds outlook – by Louise Egan (Reuters Canada – October 31, 2012)

October 31, 2012

http://ca.reuters.com/

OTTAWA (Reuters) – The Canadian economy shrank in August for the first time in six months, an unexpected contraction that pointed to a sharp slowdown in third-quarter growth and reinforced the Bank of Canada’s message that interest rate hikes are less imminent.

The 0.1 percent contraction from July reflected broad weakness across most industries as well as temporary shutdowns at some oil and mining sites, Statistics Canada said on Wednesday.

Analysts revised forecasts lower, noting economic pressures that went beyond oil and mining. The Canadian dollar fell.

The Canadian economy recovered from the global recession more quickly than most, and is expected to grow at slightly more than 2 percent this year, according to forecasts that Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said on Wednesday were still valid.

But the outlook is shaky due to the choppy U.S. recovery and the European debt crisis, prompting questions about whether August was a blip or the start of a more serious economic downturn.

Canadian gov’t investigates foreign worker permits for Chinese miners in B.C. – by James Keller (Vancouver Sun – October 30, 2012)

October 31, 2012

http://www.vancouversun.com/index.html

The Canadian Press – VANCOUVER – Ottawa is investigating controversial foreign worker permits that will allow as many as 201 Chinese miners to work a proposed project in northern British Columbia, a government spokeswoman confirmed Tuesday.

HD Mining International Ltd. has obtained permits for miners from China to conduct exploration work at its proposed Murray River project near Tumbler Ridge, B.C., located about 200 kilometres west of Grande Prairie, Alta.

The company insists there aren’t any Canadian workers trained in the specialized skills it needs. Details of those permits became public earlier this month, prompting several unions to demand Canadians be hired instead. There have also been allegations that recruiters in China demanded fees for the jobs, which HD Mining has denied.

Human Resources and Skills Development Canada is now investigating whether the permit applications met all the necessary requirements, said Alyson Queen, a spokeswoman for Human Resources Minister Diane Finley.

“The government is committed to ensuring that Canadians always have first crack at the jobs available in Canada,” Queen said in an interview Tuesday.