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Cobalt, Critical, Strategic and Rare Earth Minerals and Metals

Race Is on to Mine Metal Powering Electric Vehicles – by David Stringer (Bloomberg News – June 8, 2017)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

The race is on to supply more of the cobalt needed for batteries in the fast-growing market for electric vehicles — and that means fresh competition for the big players Glencore Plc and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

A pipeline of projects is looming in places including Australia, the U.S. and Canada after cobalt prices more than doubled in the past year. Glencore produces almost a third of the world’s supply, mainly from the Congo, which is by far the biggest source, accounting for as much as 65 percent.

Among those backing new global developments are billionaire Anil Agarwal and mining tycoon Robert Friedland. They’re aiming to capitalize as a battery boom sends demand for cobalt soaring more than 30-fold by 2030, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

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U.S. COULD FUEL WAR IN AFRICA BY DROPPING CONFLICT MINERALS RULE ARGUE SENATORS, RIGHTS GROUPS – by Conor Gaffey (Newsweek Magazine – June 8, 2017)

http://www.newsweek.com/

The United States could fuel widespread violence and corruption in central Africa if it drops a rule requiring American companies to account for their use of conflict minerals, according to U.S. senators and rights groups.

A section of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act passed under President Barack Obama in 2010 requires U.S. companies to disclose whether any of the minerals used in their products come from Democratic Republic of Congo.

The vast central African country is rich in rare and valuable minerals. Its untapped mineral reserves are estimated to be worth up to $24 trillion, according to the United Nations.Eastern Congo, the main battleground in Africa’s deadliest war between 1998 and 2003, has huge deposits of coltan, a metallic ore that is widely used in smartphones, laptops and other electronic devices.

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Cobalt ‘moving into a global deficit’ – by Trish Saywell (Northern Miner – June 7, 2017)

http://www.northernminer.com/

Cobalt prices have nearly doubled in the first quarter of the year as demand for its use in rechargeable batteries and the electric-vehicle market, in particular, is expected to take off. The Northern Miner spoke about the dynamics of the cobalt market with Edward Spencer, a senior consultant and head cobalt market analyst at the CRU Group in London.

Spencer joined CRU in 2015 as a senior consultant to CRU’s nickel, stainless steel and special alloys group, and has also worked on outlooks for molybdenum, nickel and ferrochrome. He has a PhD in economic geology from Imperial College London, where he specialized in the decoupled mineralization of base metals.

The Northern Miner: Where have cobalt prices ranged over the last year or so?

Edward Spencer: The price of 99.8% cobalt metal started at US$10.25 per lb. in January 2016 and ended the year at US$14.15 per lb. The prices have really ramped up in the first quarter of 2017, however, increasing from US$14.15 per lb. at the start of January, to US$27.75 per lb. at the end of March — nearly doubling over the three-month period.

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Cost of Elon Musk’s Dream Much Higher Than He and Others Imagine – by Brian Rogers (Real Clear Energy – June 08, 2017)

http://www.realclearenergy.org/

Brian Rogers is the Executive Director of America Rising Squared (AR2) a conservative-based policy organization.

With Elon Musk protesting President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate accord by quitting a White House advisory council, and the new Model 3 rolling off the assembly line this summer, Tesla fans must be tempted to feel pretty good about themselves these days.

After all, the company’s stock price is hitting all-time highs as thousands join a two-year wait-list not only to drive Tesla’s latest vehicle, but to do something good for the planet!

But Tesla has a dirty little secret with big implications for its future. It’s what Greenpeace International co-founder Rex Weyler calls “The Tesla dream,” the false idea that Mr. Musk’s electric vehicles (EVs) are a true game-changing “clean energy” solution to global climate change.

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New project aims to extract rare earth elements from uranium tailings – by Alex MacPherson (Saskatoon StarPhoenix – June 5, 2017)

http://thestarphoenix.com/

New technology under development in Saskatoon could make it profitable for Saskatchewan-based mining companies to extract “significant” quantities of rare earth elements from uranium tailings solution that would otherwise go to waste.

The parallel processes being piloted by Saskatchewan Research Council (SRC), which started work on the project three years ago, involve concentrating the tailings solution and then using “cells” containing mixers to separate out each of the rare earth elements.

“It’s good for our uranium companies and it’s good for the province,” said Bryan Shreiner, who heads SRC’s minerals division. “And in terms of value for Canada and the rest of the world, rare earths are in demand.”

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Two Ontario cobalt players partner on processing – staff (Northern Ontario Business – June 1, 2017)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Refinery joint venture in the works but legal questions remain on plant ownership

Two cobalt exploration companies have entered into an agreement to establish a joint venture involving a controversial refinery in northeastern Ontario. First Cobalt announced June 1 that it has entered into an option agreement to form a 50/50 joint venture partnership with Cobalt One, (formerly Equator Resources) the pending new owner of the Yukon refinery in North Cobalt.

In a news release, First Cobalt said their “strategic partnership” with Cobalt One will give them access to the refinery and 40 acres of permitted land to process silver-cobalt arsenide concentrates from its historic Keeley-Frontier mine project.

“The Yukon refinery and the 40 acres of permitted property can help us reduce the permitting timeline in a meaningful fashion for a future development project,” said First Cobalt president-CEO Trent Mell.

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Cobalt junior miner preps for summer drill program – Staff (Northern Ontario Business – May 18, 2017)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

A Toronto-based cobalt junior miner is combining old mining data with modern technology to assess if an historic mining property can be put back into operation using bulk mining techniques.

First Cobalt announced it has started fieldwork on its 2,100-hectare Keeley-Frontier Mine property and surrounding exploration claims at Silver Centre, 25 kilometres south of the historic mining town of Cobalt.

The company’s stated objective is to assess the property for its potential as a large-scale, bulk mining operation, “something which has not been considered previously for this historic mining district,” according to a May 18 new release.

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Startup uses blockchain to ensure minerals come from ethical sources – by Darren Campbell (Globe and Mail – May 18, 2017)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Dawn Jutla says her company has the technology to help put an end to the shady practice of mining precious and industrial metals to finance war.

Ms. Jutla, the president and CEO of Halifax-based startup Peer Ledger, is staking its future on a blockchain technology called Mimosi that it says can track precious metals throughout the supply chain to ensure every milligram purchased by buyers has come from an ethical source and is not funding armed conflict in war-torn countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo.

“This is important because of the damage buyers are seeing being done at the source mines among the Indigenous people who live in the area,” says Ms. Jutla, a professor of technology, entrepreneurship and innovation at St. Mary’s University in Halifax. “When I say damage I am talking about children being raped and used for labour in mines. End users of these metals are trying to use their purchasing power to prevent that.”

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Glencore Says Electric Car Boom Is Coming Faster Than Expected – by Jesse Riseborough  (Bloomberg News – May 16, 2017)

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Glencore Plc Chief Executive Officer Ivan Glasenberg said the rise of electric cars will significantly boost demand for minerals including copper and lithium in the coming decades.

“The electric vehicle revolution is happening and its impact is likely to be felt faster than expected,” Glasenberg told investors at an industry conference in Barcelona on Tuesday. Almost all carmakers are increasing investment in electric vehicles as governments adopt tighter emissions targets, he added.

Electric vehicles require more copper wiring than standard internal combustion engines. For example, the battery in an electric car contains about 38 kilograms of copper, 11 kilograms of cobalt and 11 kilograms of nickel, according to Glencore.

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[Philippines Mining Scandium] ‘Game changer’ in mining sector – by Jonathan L. Mayuga (Business Mirror – May 14, 2017)

http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/

“Grossly undervalued” nickel ores are being exported by mining companies operating in the country, a geology expert revealed, as he called on the government and the private sector to explore the economic potential of mining scandium, a mineral also found in nickel ores, and other rare earth elements.

Carlo A. Arcilla, director of the University of the Philippines National Institute of Geological Sciences in Diliman, said it is high time that the Philippine government and the private sector explored the economic potential of extracting scandium and other rare earth elements.

He said the Department of Science and Technology had agreed to initially fund a P10-million research to identify scandium-rich areas in the Philippines. The target of the study, he said, is to determine the level of scandium concentrates, which, he said, will likely be a “game changer” for nickel-mining companies.

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Cobalt-mining boys given hope – but many still suffer – by Alex Crawford (Sky News – May 10, 2017)

http://news.sky.com/

Sky News has found children continue to work long hours in cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) – months after multinational corporations insisted they had cracked down on this exploitation.

Despite multiple assurances from international companies about changing work practices and tightening up supply lines, we have found nothing has changed in practice on the ground.

After an overwhelming response to our report earlier this year, with offers of donations and adoption for the children featured in the report, as well as a White House petition demanding changes, we returned to the impoverished African country to try to find some of the young people involved.

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The critical national security battle the media isn’t telling you about – by John Moody (Fox News – May 9, 2017)

http://www.foxnews.com/

A fascinating battle is shaping up between two American entrepreneurs for control of a desert mine in California that could be the key to reviving domestic production of rare earths, the metals and materials that are critical to our national security. But there’s a catch: one entrepreneur is linked to a Russian billionaire. The other is relying on a technology company – from China.

Mountain Pass is an unsightly hole in the earth once owned by a company called Molycorp that produced more critical metals than any facility in the world. Molycorp went bankrupt in 2015 because it could not compete with Chinese rare earth producers, who don’t have the same environmental regulations that govern U.S. mining.

China now produces 95 percent of the world’s rare earths – metals that are needed for U.S. fighter jet engines, satellite guided rockets, missiles like the Tomahawk Cruise that was used to attack Syria last month, and consumer products ranging from computers to iPhones to GPS systems and microwave ovens.

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Cobalt deal gives investors another way to bet on Tesla – by Mark Burton (Globe and Mail/Bloomberg – May 8, 2017)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

LONDON — Investors looking for a way to profit from surging demand for cobalt used in batteries for Tesla Inc. electric cars have had a hard time until now.

While futures prices for the metal are up about 130 per cent since the end of 2015, a lack of buyers and sellers on the market, the high cost of more than $50,000 (U.S.) a contract, and a dearth of listed miners specializing in cobalt has kept many investors away. Pala Investments Ltd. plans to change all that.

The Swiss mining fund, which began buying cobalt about a year ago in a bet on demand, plans to sell the metal to Toronto-listed Cobalt 27 Capital Corp. The Canadian firm, headed by Pala investment team managing director Anthony Milewski, plans to raise $200-million (Canadian) on the TSX Venture exchange (ticker KBLT) to purchase cobalt, including from the Zug-based fund.

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The Human Thread Of Suffering Behind The Production Of Our Cell Phones And Laptops – by Alexandra Willis (Huffington Post South Africa – May 5, 2017)

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/

Reports around the disregard for human and labour rights in the production of smartphones and other digital technology have been rife for years. Many of the components used in our devices are reportedly sourced through child labour and inhumane working conditions. The high value of these minerals has also fuelled competition, resulting in conflict involving mass killings and rape as a weapon of war.

All of us who own a PC, phone or other electronic gadget enjoy the benefits of new technologies, but rarely do we spare a thought as to how they are made. Inside many of these electronic devices are components that began life as minerals dug underground, sometimes at a great cost of human dignity.

Miners in countries such as Myanmar, Bolivia, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) use children as young as seven who work in perilous conditions, scavenging for minerals in industrial mines and washing and sorting them before they are sold. The minerals travel through a chain of suppliers through Asia and elsewhere to be smelted into metals, and then onto the world at large where they end up in electronics, as well in vehicles and jewelry.

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Why Apple Won’t Be Able to Stop Mining Yet – by Adam Minter (Bloomberg News – April 26, 2017)

https://www.bloombergquint.com/

(Bloomberg View) — Just before Earth Day, Apple Inc. announced a new goal: to make its computers and phones and watches without mining any new raw materials. Instead, Apple would one day build its products “using only renewable resources or recycled material.” This is what’s known as a “closed loop,” in which new products are made exclusively from older versions of the same product.

If successful, Apple would no longer have to worry about digging holes in the ground, avoiding conflict minerals and the other messy details of high-tech manufacturing in the 21st century. It’s a bold idea, even for Apple, which can boast several past successes in promoting sustainable manufacturing and operations. Given both technological and commercial obstacles, however, it’s almost certain to fail.

Closed-loop recycling isn’t a new idea. In the 1930s, Ford Motor Co. spent several years operating a money-losing factory devoted to recycling old Fords into raw materials for new ones. More recently, Dell Inc. developed a breakthrough computer made using materials from old devices.

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