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Indonesia’s flood of nickel sparks ‘Darwinian’ battle for survival among miners Harry Dempsey, A. Anantha Lakshmi and Mercedes Ruehl (Financial Times – January 29, 2024)

https://www.ft.com/

Western capitals fear closure of unviable mines will increase China’s control of critical resource

Indonesia is flooding the global nickel market with low-cost supplies, forcing rivals to shut unprofitable mines and sowing panic in Washington and Paris that the upheaval will give China more control over the strategic resource.

The country, the world’s largest producer, expanded production by 30 per cent last year to 1.9mn tonnes even though global demand for the metal used in electric car batteries and stainless steel barely grew, according to investment bank Macquarie.

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‘The mining rush for green energy’: Why Ontario chiefs are asking for a moratorium on claims – by Matteo Cimellaro (National Observer – January 29, 2024)

https://www.nationalobserver.com/

Today, anybody can make a mining claim on the Ontario government’s website as long as they have a few minutes, a computer and $50. The mineral claims process happens in an electronic heartbeat, and claims are marked on a digitized map.

The result is a flood of claims on First Nations territories, huge administrative pileups and frustration among First Nations that say they are not being consulted and have no capacity to deal with the sheer volume of mineral claims.

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Europe’s thirst for lithium threatens livelihoods, biodiversity in Portugal – by Marta Vidal (Al Jazeera – January 30, 2024)

https://www.aljazeera.com/

Open-pit mines are planned for Portugal’s northern region, worrying locals who say their livelihoods are at risk.

Covas do Barroso, Portugal – Paulo Pires walked up the hill with his flock of sheep and dogs on a warm day in August, as a stream of water gushed down an ancient irrigation channel that has been maintained by local communities over many generations. “There is a lot of wealth here,” said Pires, now resting in the shade of an oak tree by the flowing water.

For centuries, Covas do Barroso’s water, pastures and forests have been managed collectively to integrate farming, livestock and forestry in a sustainable manner. But Pires is worried. Savannah Resources, a company based in the United Kingdom, aims to develop Western Europe’s largest open-pit lithium mine in Barroso, bordering the Peneda-Geres National Park in northeastern Portugal.

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Blade runners: how LFP batteries brought EV metal markets back to earth – by Frik Els (Mining.com – January 5, 2024)

https://www.mining.com/

It’s January 2024, and unfortunately for said cobalt and nickel bulls the blow from the iron fist is even more severe than feared. And the runaway success has become a battery-powered juggernaut.

During that month nearly four years ago when Elon Musk first announced the move to LFP batteries, the cathode chemistry contributed less than 50 tonnes to overall battery metal demand, according to Adamas Intelligence, Toronto-based research consultants tracking demand for EV batteries by chemistry, cell supplier and capacity in over 110 countries.

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Magna Mining drills to expand nickel resources at former INCO mine – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – January 29, 2024)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Canadian, U.S. government incentives look attractive to Sudbury mine developer

The global nickel price is slumping but Magna Mining isn’t breaking stride in making progress to bring two former Sudbury mines back into production. Magna Mining will be running two winter drilling programs at its Crean Hill and Shakespeare properties at the outset of what the local company anticipates will be an exciting year to make new discoveries on these brownfield properties.

With more than $15 million banked, Magna plans to do 25,000 metres of drilling this year, most of it at Crean Hill, a former INCO mine property containing nickel, copper and platinum group metals that the company acquired in November 2022.

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Norway defends deep-sea mining, says it may help to break China and Russia’s rare earths stronghold – by Sam Meredith (CNBC.com January 29, 2024)

https://www.cnbc.com/

Norway says its controversial decision to approve deep-sea mining is a necessary step into the unknown that could help to break China and Russia’s rare earths dominance. In a vote earlier this month that attracted cross-party support, Norway’s parliament voted 80-20 to approve a government proposal to open a vast ocean area for commercial-scale deep-sea mining.

It makes the northern European country the first in the world to move forward with the process of extracting minerals from the seabed. Norway’s government said the practice could be one way to help facilitate the global transition away from fossil fuels, adding that every country should be exploring ways to sustainably collect metals and minerals at their disposal.

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Albemarle lays off 300 employees on weak lithium prices – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – January 29, 2024)

https://www.mining.com/

Albemarle (NYSE: ALB), the world’s largest lithium producer, is said to have laid off more than 300 employees, or 4% of its total workforce, across its US and global operations.

The move, reported by The Information, comes as an oversupply of the ultra-light metal used in electric-vehicle (EV) batteries has caused prices to collapse. Lithium has plunged more than 80% from a late-2022 record high, with experts predicting that lithium carbonate prices in top consumer and producer China could fall by more than 30% this year from December 2023 levels.

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OPINION: End the runaround on the Ring of Fire – by Editorial Board (Globe and Mail – January 25, 2024)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

More than 16 years have passed since a small mining company discovered a rich nickel deposit in a remote part of northern Ontario and christened the region with a name that has stuck: the Ring of Fire.

Successive governments and companies have touted the potential of the region, entranced by optimistic estimates of tens of billions of dollars of minerals – including those critical to electric vehicle battery production – buried in the wetlands.

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Ring of Fire Metals CEO provides update – by Austin Campbell (SNnewswatch.com – January 24, 2024)

https://www.snnewswatch.com/

Businesses and organizations from Thunder Bay and throughout the North heard a presentation from Ring of Fire Metals CEO Kristan Straub at the Italian Cultural Centre on Jan. 23.

THUNDER BAY — Kristan Straub provided an update on the proposed Eagle’s Nest mining project on Tuesday at the Italian Cultural Centre. The chief executive officer of Ring of Fire Metals delivered a presentation describing how far the project has come.

Ring of Fire Metals is the Canadian subsidiary of Australian company, Wyloo Metals. One concern about the Eagle’s Nest project is the fact that it is being built on treaty-protected lands, meaning any development in the region needs to happen in consultation with and approval from surrounding First Nations communities.

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Ford says Northern Ontario mines will help create economic boom – by Staff (Sudbury.com – January 24, 2024)

https://www.sudbury.com/

Premier addresses municipal leaders at the annual meeting of the Rural Ontario Municipal Association

Ontario Premier Doug Ford said he is counting on the Northern Ontario mining industry to help build Ontario into an economic powerhouse for the battery electric vehicle (BEV) industry.

Ford was speaking Jan. 23 at the annual conference of the 2024 Rural Ontario Municipal Association(ROMA) when he spoke about the importance of the Ontario critical minerals strategy for the future of EVs in Ontario.

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Bolivia Uyuni plant to yield first lithium by 2025-end – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – January 22, 2024)

https://www.mining.com/

Bolivian state-owned lithium company YLB has inked a new deal with a Chinese consortium to install a pilot plant at the vast Uyuni salt flat, which would use Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) technology.

The project will see the construction of a 2,500 tonnes-per-year lithium carbonate facility that will be operated by the CBC consortium, formed by CATL, BRUNP and CMOC.

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Opinion: Indonesia’s bid for EV nickel supremacy is doomed to failure – by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard (The Telegram/Yahoo News – January 19, 2024)

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/

When Indonesia launched its bid to corner the world’s nickel market and gain a stranglehold on electric vehicles, it overlooked one crucial detail. Battery technology is moving so fast that the world may not need the nickel after all. Indonesia is cutting down its rainforests and polluting the Coral Triangle for what looks increasingly like a commercial mirage.

Cheap and safe LFP batteries (lithium iron phosphate) are already so good that they have conquered 70pc of the EV mass market in China. They use neither nickel nor cobalt.

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Junior miner shows more nickel to be had in the Sudbury basin – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – January 19, 2024)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

SPC Nickel posts maiden mineral estimate on West Graham Project

An emerging Sudbury nickel mining company has posted a first-time mineral estimate of its deposit in the Sudbury basin. SPC Nickel released a maiden estimate of its West Graham Project on Jan. 17, one of two deposits on its Lockerby East nickel and copper property in an area which has seen previous mining operations.

The company said in the news release that West Graham has the potential to be developed quickly as a low-cost, open-pit operation in its initial stages of mining. But with more exploration, West Graham has huge mineral upside at depth.

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China Cobalt Buyers Use Global Glut to Challenge Pricing – by Annie Lee, William Clowes and Jack Farchy (Bloomberg News – January 16, 2024)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — China’s battery industry has seized on a glut in the global cobalt market to push through a change in the way the commodity is priced.

A rapid expansion of cobalt mining in Democratic Republic of Congo and Indonesia has output racing ahead of demand, dragging down global prices. It’s also prompted a push by squeezed Chinese refineries to win changes in how cobalt is bought and sold.

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BHP’s warning on battery minerals is striking – by James Thomson (Australian Financial Review – January 2024)

https://www.afr.com/

Demand from the energy transition was supposed to underpin strong prices for nickel and lithium. But the battery minerals slump appears to be entering a new phase.

The most interesting word in BHP’s December quarter operations update can be found on page 14 – “structural”. That’s how the mining giant describes the changes ripping through the nickel sector, and threatening the viability of its Nickel West project in Western Australia.

“The nickel industry is undergoing a number of structural changes and is at a cyclical low in realised pricing,” BHP said. “Nickel West is not immune to these challenges. Operations are being actively optimised, and options are being evaluated to mitigate the impacts of the sharp fall in nickel prices.” BHP also said it would consider whether it needed to take a writedown on the value of the Nickel West asset.

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