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Alaska Mining

US not adequately planning for raw materials needed to fuel policy initiatives – Pebble developer – by Darren Parker (MiningWeekly.com – July 19, 2022)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

“Pebble is the largest undeveloped copper deposit in the world and
the proposed Pebble mine needs to be part of this solution, instead
of being portrayed as part of the problem by misguided environmental
activists who do not have a credible plan for reaching net-zero,”
Thiessen added.

Northern Dynasty, the company behind the controversial Pebble copper project, in Alaska, has urged politicians, environmental activists and the public to pay attention to concerns raised by the mining industry about a looming copper supply gap.

Commenting on a recent report by S&P Global, entitled ‘The Future of Copper: Will the looming supply gap short-circuit the energy transition?’, Northern Dynasty CEO Ron Thiessen said the conclusions were consistent with comments and concerns previously raised by the company and other key mining industry companies and organisations.

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Operator of Red Dog zinc mine in Northwest Alaska advances plans that could lead to large expansion – by Alex DeMarban (Anchorage Daily News – June 16, 2022)

https://www.adn.com/

The company that operates the Red Dog zinc mine in Northwest Alaska is seeking state and federal approval for a multi-year exploration plan in the area that could one day lead to a large expansion of its operations.

Teck American, a subsidiary of Teck Resources in Canada, has applied with the Alaska Department of Natural Resources to build a 10-mile exploration road, plus bridges and related facilities, the agency said in a public notice last week. The road would extend from the mine to two large new prospects to the north, known as Aktigiruq and Anarraaq.

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There is something wrong, very wrong – by J.P. Tangen (North of 60 Mining News – June 3, 2022)

https://www.miningnewsnorth.com/

Recently, the Environmental Protection Agency, citing section 404(c) of the Clean Water Act, announced its intention to prohibit the use of the Bristol Bay watershed for discharging dredged or fill material from the Pebble Project. Both of our Senators issued statements giving qualified support for the proposed decision.

Senator Murkowski, however, took the position that she has “never supported a blanket, preemptive approach for any project” recognizing “that this could be used as a precedent to target resource development projects across our state.”

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Biden Admin Blocks Yet Another Massive Mining Project, Hobbling Its Own Climate Agenda – by Thomas Catenacci (Ohio Star – May 31, 2022)

https://theohiostar.com/

The Biden administration proposed stringent clean water restrictions on a watershed in southwest Alaska Wednesday, a potential fatal blow to a planned critical mineral development project.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it would review a proposal to prohibit the use of the Bristol Bay watershed as a discharge site for the Pebble Project, a mining project that would produce about 1.5 billion tons of critical minerals, including copper and molybdenum, over 20 years.

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Biden Plan Would Block Pebble Gold Mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay – by Jennifer A Dlouhy (Bloomberg News – May 25, 2022)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — The Biden administration on Wednesday is outlining new pollution restrictions that would thwart a long-stalled plan to mine for gold near Alaska’s Bristol Bay.

Under the proposed requirements, the Environmental Protection Agency would broadly bar developers of the planned Pebble Mine from disposing waste near the site because of the potential harm to the area’s thriving, $2 billion salmon fishery.

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Barrick’s massive Donlin gold project in Alaska faces pushback from Indigenous groups – by Nial McGee (Globe and Mail – May 3, 2022)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Barrick Gold Corp. is facing pushback from Indigenous stakeholders in Alaska who are concerned about the environmental damage the massive Donlin gold mine could cause if it gets the go ahead.

Toronto-based Barrick, the world’s second biggest gold producer, held its annual shareholder meeting on Wednesday and two of the three questions asked by stakeholders revolved around Donlin’s potentially negative impact on the ecosystem.

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Canadian Mine Waste Is Crossing Borders and Facing International Backlash – by Stephen Robert Miller (Discovery Magazine – February 5, 2022)

https://www.discovermagazine.com/

For decades, Canadian waterways have carried toxic mine waste through natural ecosystems, into tribal lands and across the U.S. border. A coalition of indigenous leaders and scientists are now calling for international protection.

In the bitter cold winter of 2017, British Columbia’s minister of energy and mines discovered that someone had staked a mining claim in his actual backyard. The request had come without notice or warning.

If approved, it would allow the people behind it to pan for precious minerals in streambeds on his Cranbrook, B.C., property, less than 50 miles north of the U.S. border.

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US needs to develop its own copper resources, says Pebble owner – by Mariaan Webb (MiningWeekly.com – January 20, 2022)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Northern Dynasty, the owner of the contentious Pebble copper/gold mine, in south-west Alaska, says that the US must develop its own copper resources to ensure a successful energy transition to a zero-carbon economy.

Citing forecasts from major banks about a looming deficit and higher copper prices, CEO Ron Thiessen says that the “only realistic way to meet demand is to increase production”.

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Opinion: Keep Alaska’s pristine wild lands free of poisonous industrial mining – by Seth Kantner (Seattle Times – January 19, 2022)

https://www.seattletimes.com/

Seth Kantner lives in northern Alaska and is a commercial fisherman and the author of “Ordinary Wolves” and recently released, “A Thousand Trails Home: Living With Caribou.”

This fall before the ice froze, I started a letter to President Joe Biden. I was gathering cranberries on the hill above the old sod igloo where I was born and raised, thinking while my hands worked, thinking about food, and health, and how here that is the definition of success.

The berries were still liquid, soft and not easy to pick without crushing. They stained my fingers pink where my nails and knuckles weren’t coated dark with blood from the caribou I’d hunted earlier, for meat. I hadn’t found snow to wash my hands.

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Lawmakers in Alaska and Washington state push B.C. on mining regulations – by Brenda Owen (City News/Canadian Press – June 1, 2021)

https://toronto.citynews.ca/

VANCOUVER — Lawmakers in Alaska and Washington state are renewing calls for British Columbia to strengthen its mining regulations to protect shared waterways.

A group of 25 members of the Washington state legislature sent a letter to Premier John Horgan in March, saying a tailings dam breach at one of several mines in B.C. within 100 kilometres of the state’s border could damage transboundary rivers and fisheries.

Eight Alaskan state legislators followed with a letter to Horgan in May expressing their constituents’ “deep concerns” about the potential impacts of abandoned, active and future mines on shared waterways.

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Forgotten chain of Alaska mining history – by A.J. Roan (North of 60 Mining News – April 30, 2021)

https://www.miningnewsnorth.com/

After the United States’ purchase of Alaska, and before the boom brought on by the Klondike Gold Rush, a small island just off the Alaska Peninsula would have gold-bearing quartz discovered, inevitably booming a small trade hub known as Delarov, or as it came to be known, Unga.

As it stretches like a broken bridge from the continent of North America to the continent of Asia, many forget the large chain of islands that occupies an area of 6,821 square miles and extends nearly 1,200 miles westward from the Alaska Peninsula to the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia, is in fact inhabited and even a part of the great northern state.

The Alaska Peninsula and 167 named Aleutian Islands, extending more than 1,000 miles off Southwest Alaska form a border between the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea.

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More drilling planned at Donlin this year – by Staff (MiningWeekly.com – March 29, 2021)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Donlin Gold, the 50:50 joint venture between Barrick Gold and Novagold Resources, has confirmed a follow-up drill programme for the Alaska project this year, following the strong outcome of its 2020 campaign.

Additional confirmation and extension drilling is planned, with specifics to be finalised once all assay results from the 2020 drill programme have been integrated into an interim model update.

Thereafter, the focus will shift to updating the feasibility study. Barrick and Novagold last week announced the final assay results from the 2020 drill programme, which the companies said exceeded expectations.

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Alaska-B.C. mine rivers generally healthy: state-province joint report – by Jeremy Hainsworth (Business In Vancouver – February 25, 2021)

https://biv.com/

A four-year study of Alaska-B.C. rivers associated with mining activity – spurred by U.S. and Canadian complaints about environmental threats – has concluded there aren’t risks to marine habitat.

People on both sides in the Alaska Panhandle region, including at least one U.S. senator, had complained to then U.S. President Barack Obama’s secretary of state John Kerry that discharges associated with B.C. mines such as the Red Chris, KSM and New Polaris Mine were leaching materials into ocean waters and threatening fisheries.

While the concerns date back many years, it was the 2014 collapse of the Mount Polley mine tailings dam, which sent a torrent of 25 million cubic metres of water and mine slurry into nearby creeks, that intensified calls for border mine discharges to be examined.

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Alaska mine output rises, nation’s drops – by Shane Lasley (North of 60 Mining News – February 5, 2021)

https://www.miningnewsnorth.com/

Alaska mines produced roughly $3.16 billion worth of non-fuel minerals last year, a slight increase over the $3.13 billion during 2019, according to Mineral Commodity Summaries 2020 published by the U.S. Geological Survey on Feb. 2

The rise in Alaska mine production value is largely due to higher gold output at Alaska’s large mines and record setting prices for the precious metal last year.

According to early estimates by the Alaska Division of Geological & Geophysical Surveys, Alaska mines produced roughly 1.2 billion pounds of zinc, 265 million lb of lead, 620,000 ounces of gold and 15.5 million oz silver.

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US government gives high priority status to Graphite One’s Alaskan project – Daniel Sekulich (Northern Miner – February 3, 2021)

https://www.northernminer.com/

In mid-January Graphite One’s (TSX: GPH; US-OTC: GPHOF) Graphite Creek project in Alaska was designated as a High-Priority Infrastructure Project (HPIP) by the U.S. government’s Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Committee (FPISC). The approval comes after the project was originally nominated for HPIP designation by Alaskan governor Mike Dunleavy in October, 2019.

In his 2019 nomination letter to the FPISC, Governor Dunleavy wrote that designating Graphite Creek as a High-Priority Infrastructure Project “will send a strong signal that the U.S. intends to end the days of our 100% import-dependency for this increasingly critical mineral.”

The Vancouver-based company says that Graphite Creek, which is located in Alaska’s Seward Peninsula, about 55 km north of the city of Nome, is the highest grade and largest known large flake graphite deposit in the U.S. The site is adjacent to the Imuruk Basin, which opens into the Bering Strait that separates Alaska from Siberian Russia.

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