Australia/New Caledonia/Papua New Guinea Mining – Page 121

Nova asset ‘world class’, says Sirius as it publishes DFS – by Esmarie Swanepoel (MiningWeekly.com – July 14, 2014)

July 14, 2014

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

PERTH (miningweekly.com) – A definitive feasibility study (DFS) into nickel developer Sirius Resources’ Nova project, in Western Australia, has confirmed that the project’s low cash cost would allow it to fall in the lowest quartile of nickel producers globally.

Sirius reported on Monday that the Nova project was expected to generate net cash flow of A$2.74-billion from a nickel revenue of some A$4.53-billion, over the project’s ten-year mine life.

C1 cash operating costs after by-product credits were forecast to be A$1.66/lb nickel in concentrate, which was better than the 2013 scoping study estimates.

The DFS slightly increased the expected capital expenditure for the project to A$473-million, up from the A$471-million estimated in the scoping study, with the capital cost now including extra risk mitigating measures.

The DFS was based on a processing rate of 1.5-million tonnes a year, to deliver about 26 000 t/y of nickel, 11 500 t/y of copper and 850 t/y of cobalt over a ten-year mine life.

The study was based on a maiden probable ore reserve of 13.1-million tonnes, grading 2.1% nickel, 0.9% copper and 0.07% cobalt, for 273 000 t of nickel, 112 000 t of copper and 9 000 t of cobalt.

BHP sell-off could undo Billiton deal – by Danny Fortson (The Australian – July 14, 2014)

July 14, 2014

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/

The Sunday Times – A FEW days after Paul Anderson unveiled the largest merger in the history of the mining industry, the American boss of BHP went on a Sunday talk show to put politicians’ minds at rest. They were concerned that BHP, the 116-year-old national champion known as “the Big Australian”, was about to be lost to London.

Mr Anderson and Brian Gilbertson, head of smaller rival Billiton, had just announced a $US28 billion tie-up that would create a new natural resources Goliath.

Billiton was already listed in London. BHP, meanwhile, ran its giant oil operation from London. A relocation of the group headquarters from Melbourne seemed a distinct possibility. After all, the combined group would stretch across five continents and produce everything from diamonds and oil to nickel and iron. Why not run it from Europe’s financial capital?

The fears, Mr Anderson assured, were misplaced.

He said the merger was “a win-win”. There would be housekeeping to be done but a headquarters move would not be part of it. “I’m sure there will be two or three things in the portfolio that we will want to sell off … once we put the companies together,” he said.

Geologists seek work – any work – as mining boom goes bust – by James Regan (July 11, 2014)

July 11, 2014

http://www.reuters.com/

SYDNEY – (Reuters) – After 25 years working around the world as a highly paid geologist earning a six-digit salary, Phil Scheimer is back in Australia weighing up his future prospects: day labourer or pizza delivery man.

The collapse of the global mining boom is decimating the ranks of working geologists. With little chance of employment, many are being forced into unwanted career changes to pay the bills.

“I just want the phone to ring and for someone to say we’ve got work for you, any work,” says Scheimer from his home in Perth, a city in western Australia that rode the mining boom over the past decade but is now facing tens of thousands of people returning from mining camps jobless.

While scores of truck drivers, equipment operators, mechanics and other mining staff have also seen their numbers pared, geologists are among the hardest hit as companies abandon exploration and concentrate on working existing mines.

“Times are dire,” said Perth-based geology consultant Wendy Corbett. “I have been in the exploration industry for 41 years and this is the worst I have ever seen it.”

A second unemployed geologist, who has explored for nickel in Australia and Africa, said he had recently completed a three-day barista’s course and hoped for a steady paycheck after interviewing with a Sydney coffee house.

Five hours’ flying time winds clock back to the beginning – by Paul Garvey (The Australian – July 10, 2014)

July 10, 2014

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/

THE economic growth of China in the past decade has generated tens of billions of dollars in profits for Australia’s mining companies, but it was all about Japan in the heart of the company’s Pilbara iron ore operations yesterday.

Shinzo Abe made a flying two-hour visit to the West Angelas mine in the remote pocket of Western Australia, following through on an invitation made by Rio Tinto chief executive Sam Walsh in Tokyo last year.

The five-hour journey across the country from Canberra to the Pilbara left its mark on Mr Abe, giving him more time to talk with Tony Abbott.

“I was extremely impressed that I could take a five-hour flight and still be in Australia. I’m really amazed by how big this country is,” he said through an interpreter, addressing a gathering on the edge of the gaping West Angelas open-pit as huge trucks rumbled past hauling iron ore bound for Asia.

“The flight took twice as long as the summit meeting we had yesterday, but I actually believe that we had deeper discussions on the flight and we will really be able to deepen our relationship as well.”

Glencore kicks off $2bn takeover race for Syrah Resources – by Amanda Saunders (Sydney Morning Herald – July 10, 2014)

May 13, 2016July 10, 2014

http://www.smh.com.au/

Swiss commodities giant Glencore is understood to have made an informal approach to Syrah Resources that could value the graphite and vanadium junior at as much as to $2 billion.

Melbourne-based Syrah’s prized asset is the mammoth Balama graphite and vanadium deposit in northern Mozambique.

After the Fairfax Media revealed Glencore’s interest on Thursday, the company’s shares surged as much as 25 per cent before it dived into a trading halt before noon. When shares were halted, Syrah’s shares were up 19 per cent at $5.09. The shares have more than doubled in value since touching a 52-week low of $2 on July 10 last year.

Syrah responded promptly to the report and a share price query from the market operator on Thursday afternoon, saying, “From time to time Syrah receives informal,confidential and non-binding enquiries from various parties regarding Syrah’s interest in entering takeover discussions”.

“None of these enquiries have progressed to formal discussions or resulted in any indicative offers being received by Syrah.”

Sources say Ivan Glasenberg’s Glencore, one of the largest producers of primary vanadium in the world, is keen to exert control over the wider vanadium market. Pouncing on Syrah and securing its Balama project would be an early strategic play to shut out fresh competition.

Australia’s big three miners look to tighten their iron grip – by Jamie Smyth (Financial Times – July 8, 2014)

July 9, 2014

http://www.ft.com/intl/companies/mining

Port Hedland – The man who made a US$10bn bet on the global iron ore market is predicting Australia’s big three miners will tighten their grip on the global industry over the next few years as higher cost producers fall victim to lower iron ore prices.

Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest, founder and chairman of Fortescue Metals Group, says the sharp fall in iron ore prices since the start of the year is causing some smaller Australian producers and overseas competitors to exit the industry.

“Because you have incredibly low operating costs with the big Australian producers we are seeing more substitution take place from China and India as competitors switch off production,” says Mr Forrest, who owns one-third of Fortescue shares.

“The wholesale shutting down of iron ore production industries basically happens in other countries. The Pilbara [in Western Australia] has always been historically the big player.”

BHP nickel sale hits hurdle – by Nick Evan (The West Australian – July 9, 2014)

July 9, 2014

https://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/

A native title ruling could throw a shadow over BHP Billiton’s attempts to sell its Nickel West assets, after the Federal Court ruling last week paved the way for native title claims over BHP’s Kambalda nickel concentrator and Gold Fields’ St Ives mine.

In a decision released last week, the Federal Court ruled that the transfer of mining tenements from State Agreements between 2004 and 2007 should have triggered negotiations for a land use agreement with the Ngadju people, who claim native title over the region around Norseman and Kambalda.

The ruling covers more than 200 mining leases transferred from State agreements originally held by Western Mining Corporation.

They include leases over BHP’s Kambalda nickel concentrator and Gold Fields’ 400,000 ounce-a-year St Ives mine, the fourth largest gold producer in Australia last year.

Gold Fields said in January the action could force the closure of St Ives if the native title claimants sought an injunction to do so.

But the company softened its rhetoric this week, saying in a statement the decision “does not affect the grant of mining tenure to St Ives”. It added operations would continue as usual pending the outcome of the process.

Australian nickel projects on sale – by Lawrence Williams (Mineweb.com – July 7, 2014)

July 8, 2014

http://www.mineweb.com/

Western Australian nickel assets owned by two of the world’s largest producers of the metal have been sold or are currently up for sale and attracting much interest.

LONDON (MINEWEB) – Australian nickel projects, presumably deemed non-core businesses, by mining majors BHP Billiton, and Norilsk Nickel are either reportedly up for sale, or sales have been agreed, which will see some of the country’s nickel production, or potential output move into the hands of new ownership. Australia was the world’s fourth largest nickel producer (after the Philippines, Indonesia and Russia) in 2012.

BHP Billiton, which had previously sold off its Ravensthorpe nickel mine and metallurgical plant to First Quantum back in December 2009 for $340 million – having cost over $2 billion to build – is now looking to sell the rest of its Western Australian nickel operations which come under its Nickel West banner, comprising the Mount Keith Nickel mine, Leinster Nickel mine, Kambalda Nickel concentrator, Kalgoorlie Nickel rmelter and Kwinana Nickel refinery.

There are reportedly six major potential suitors for the package, including Mick Davis’ X2 Resources. BHP inherited its nickel mining operations through the take-over of Western Mining in 2005.

Simultaneously, Norilsk Nickel the world’s largest nickel producer, has announced that through its Australian subsidiaries, MPI Nickel and Black Swan Nickel it has agreed to sell its Black Swan/Silver Swan assets, also located in Western Australia and currently under care and maintenance, to Poseidon Nickel. Norilsk had been reported as planning to sell all of its Australian assets back in May.

BHP Billiton looks to catch up to Rio Tinto in ironman contest – by Amanda Saunders (The Age – July 7, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://www.theage.com.au/business

Miner BHP Billiton is confident it can ”close the gap” with iron ore arch-rival Rio Tinto on margin per tonne within a few years.

And it is likely to develop the $20 billion outer-harbour project at Port Hedland rather than expand its inner-harbour operation if it moves to produce beyond its current annual run rate target of 270 million tonnes. BHP president of iron ore Jimmy Wilson says the miner is trailing Rio on margin per tonne, and ”our desire absolutely is to close that gap”.

He said the miner would never be in a competition with Rio on volumes but stressed ”where we would like to compete is on the cost of production side, more importantly, the margin per tonne that we make”.

”While we are marginally behind Rio at the moment, we’ve got to back the fact that we are going to eliminate that gap in the foreseeable future,” he says.

”What is the foreseeable future? I’d be disappointed if it took more than a couple of years. ”I do respect our competitors – Rio, Fortescue, Vale – [and] none of them is standing still either. So, I think, at the end of the day, you are going to see an improvement come through for all of those businesses.”

Trafigura Among Six to Enter BHP Nickel Sale, Review Says – by Ben Sharples (Bloomberg News – July 06, 2014)

July 7, 2014

http://www.businessweek.com/

Trafigura Beheer BV and Sherritt International Corp. (S) are among six companies to enter the sale process for BHP Billiton Ltd.’s Australian nickel unit, according to a report from the Australian Financial Review.

Glencore Plc, X2 Resources, Jinchuan Group Co. and MMG Ltd., a unit of China Minmetals Corp., are also among bidders that have started due diligence on BHP’s Nickel West business, the newspaper reported today, without saying where it got the information. Emily Perry, a Melbourne-based spokeswoman for BHP, declined to comment in an e-mailed response.

BHP said in May it’s considering selling all or part of its Australian nickel unit as prices surge amid an Indonesian export ban on the steel hardening agent. The due diligence process may take months and BHP is keen to finalize a deal by the end of the year, the newspaper said. The business may be worth more than A$800 million ($749 million), according to the newspaper.

Michael Oke, a spokesman for London-based X2 Resources, Francis de Rosa, a Sydney-based spokesman for Glencore, and Kathleen Kawecki, a Melbourne-based spokeswoman for MMG, didn’t immediately respond to e-mails sent outside of normal business hours seeking comment on the sale process. Three calls to Gao Tianpeng, the general manager of Jinchuan’s asset operation department, went unanswered.

Amsterdam-based Trafigura and Toronto-based Sherritt didn’t immediately respond to e-mails seeking comment.

NEWS RELEASE: BHP BILLITON SHIPS ONE BILLION TONNES OF IRON ORE TO JAPAN – July 2, 2014

July 7, 2014

BHP Billiton today celebrated the shipment of its one billionth tonne of iron ore to Japan with customers, joint venture participants and employees in Port Hedland, Western Australia.

BHP Billiton President Iron Ore Jimmy Wilson and BHP Billiton President HSE, Marketing and Technology Mike Henry were joined by joint venture participants ITOCHU Corporation (ITOCHU) and Mitsui & Co., Ltd (Mitsui) to mark the milestone in front of the Saiko bound for Japan.

Mr Henry acknowledged Japan’s industrial transformation and the importance of two-way trade in driving economic growth.

“In the late 1960s and through the 1970s, Japan grew to become an economic powerhouse through its expertise in steel manufacturing, heavy industry, technology and electronics,” he said.

Glencore slams Australian report that it paid zero tax in three years – by Henry Lazenby (MiningWeekly.com – July 3, 2014)

July 4, 2014

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Global diversified mining giant and commodity trader Glencore has condemned a recent report by Australian media company Fairfax Media, claiming that through aggressive tax structuring, Glencore had paid zero tax over the past three years, despite earning income of A$15-billion.

Business and technology news website Business Insider had published an internal email to staff by Glencore’s coal CE, Peter Freyberg, in which he dispelled the media speculation surrounding its tax payments, saying that the firm had paid A$400-million in corporate income tax since 2011.

He also said Glencore had paid A$8-billion in royalties and taxes, including A$2-billion related to corporate income tax, in Australia since 2007.

“As you will be acutely aware, for much of this period the resource industries in which we participate have faced significant challenges including low commodity prices, high input costs and a robust Australian dollar.

“Profitability is significantly lower than during the preceding four years – the reality is that a significant proportion of Australia’s coal mines are currently operating at a loss and although we run an efficient business, we are not immune to the market conditions.

COLUMN-Copper is unexpected victim of Indonesian export ban – by Andy Home (Reuters India – July 3, 2014)

July 3, 2014

http://in.reuters.com/

The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a columnist for Reuters.

(Reuters) – When Indonesia banned the export of unprocessed minerals in January of this year, the consensus view was that the most significant impact would be on the nickel and aluminium raw material markets in that order.

Copper barely warranted a mention.

Analysts at Macquarie Bank, for example, issued a research note on January 14, two days after the ban came into effect, examining the implications in a question-and-answer format. The only reference to copper came in the 19th bullet point under the telling heading: “Have copper producers been let entirely off the hook?”

Six months on, though, and one of the country’s two giant copper mines is on care and maintenance and the other has cut production by half. There have been no concentrate exports since January.

Not only is this the single biggest hit to copper mine supply this year but it is acting to accelerate a fracturing of the copper concentrates pricing model.

Both Freeport McMoRan, which owns and operates the Grasberg mine, and Newmont Mining, major stakeholder in and operator of the Batu Hijau mine, appear to have been blind-sided by the January rule changes.

NEW CALEDONIA: Is a Vast Marine Sanctuary Any Use if You Can’t Police It? – by Ian Lloyd Neubauer (Time Magazine – June 29, 2014)

July 2, 2014

http://time.com/

Tiny New Caledonia relies on a handful of French ships to patrol a marine reserve twice the size of Texas

For the first half of June — until the U.S. declared an even bigger one — the tiny, French semiautonomous territory of New Caledonia boasted the largest nature reserve on earth.

Covering a vast 1.3 million-sq-km region of the South Pacific, the Natural Park of the Coral Sea was established on May 28 to protect the world’s second largest coral reef and its attendant lagoon. Already safeguarded in parts by a UNESCO World Heritage listing, this wonderland is a nursery for 25 kinds of marine mammals (including sea cows and humpback whales), 48 species of shark and five different marine turtles. It also spawns vast numbers of pelagic fish, 3,000 tons of which make it into the Pacific every year – an important food source for tens of millions, and a source of employment for thousands of people living in the region.

But before most people had even heard of the creation of the Natural Park of the Coral Sea, U.S. President Barack Obama went one better by using his executive powers to create an even larger marine park in the south-central Pacific on June 17. Known as the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, it protects 2 million sq km of ocean and a smattering of islands and atolls between Hawaii and American Samoa from commercial fishing.

Obama’s announcement made world news, while New Caledonia’s barely received a mention. Perhaps that’s because the U.S., while sketchy on the details, has the hardware and manpower to enforce the no-take rule at the core of any national park.

Nautilus Minerals Inc says it’s poised to begin undersea mining following dispute settlement – by Peter Koven (National Post – June 26, 2014)

June 26, 2014

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

A lot of investors won’t believe it until they see it. But Nautilus Minerals Inc. maintains it is back on track to become the world’s first company to mine metals under the sea.

“It’s been a very exciting year,” chairman Geoffrey Loudon said at the company’s annual meeting in Toronto on Wednesday. “A lot of things have happened that we’ve waited an awful long time for.”

Most significantly, the company settled a two-year dispute with the government of Papua New Guinea (PNG) over ownership of its Solwara 1 copper-gold project in April. The dispute was a giant black cloud over the company.

But there are significant hurdles ahead. For one thing, Toronto-based Nautilus still needs to secure a ship, something it has been talking about for many years. At the meeting, chief executive Mike Johnston said that should be a done deal by November, with Nautilus either chartering a ship or buying one.

Following that event, he laid out a path that could bring the company into first production as soon as 2017. And once Solwara 1 is mined out, Nautilus can theoretically move its ship and seafloor mining equipment over to the next deposit.