International Media Resource Articles – Page 614

Coal mining union says West Virginia should build new plants if EPA rules upheld – by Valerie Volcovici (Reuters U.S. – October 27, 2015)

October 28, 2015

http://www.reuters.com/

WASHINGTON – West Virginia can keep its coal mining alive by building “next-generation” power plants co-fired by coal and natural gas, even as the state challenges federal carbon emission rules in court, the president of the mine workers’ union said Tuesday.

United Mine Workers of America President Cecil Roberts told a conference hosted by West Virginia’s governor the state should become the first to build new power plants that run on coal and natural gas, keeping coal-mining viable in a state hit by changing market conditions.

The union and West Virginia’s attorney general have both filed petitions in federal court to block the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) carbon rules that limit emissions from new and existing power plants.

West Virginia lawmakers also lead efforts in Congress to try block EPA regulations. But Roberts said the state should make plans for complying with the regulations in case legal challenges fail.

Mining was at the heart of Ely’s selfhood – by Angie Riebe (Mesabi Daily News – October 27, 2015)

October 28, 2015

http://www.virginiamn.com/

City Could Renew Former Identity

ELY — The Ely that Mayor Chuck Novak knew as a child was very different from the one he governs today. Several of its mines were active.

And even when Ely was down to two, and then one remaining operation, the community that came to be because of the industry retained that identity. It was a mining town.

Sure, with a grand wilderness as its neighbor, those seeking outdoor adventures flocked to the town to traverse and camp amid what would become the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.

And logging trucks and lumberjacks were part of the city’s personality as logging operations endured. But each day miners headed to work — just as they had since the 1880s. Mining was at the heart of Ely’s selfhood.

[VIDEO] Inside Rio Tinto’s Oyu Tolgoi underground mine – by Robert Spence (Global Mining – October 27, 2015)

October 27, 2015

http://www.miningglobal.com/

Located in the southern Gobi desert of Mongolia, roughly 50 miles from the China border, Rio Tinto’s Oyu Tolgoi mine is anticipated to become one of the largest copper-gold deposits in the world.

First discovered in 2001, the mine is expected to produce an average of 430,000 tons of copper and 425,000 ounces of gold per year, as well as by-product silver and molybdenum, over its mine life. The mine estimated to contain 2.7 million tons of recoverable copper and 1.7 million ounces of recoverable gold in reserves, with an estimated operating life cycle of 50 years.

POSCO may build Magnis Resources’ Tanzanian graphite project – by Sonali Paul (Reuters U.S. – October 27, 2015)

May 13, 2016October 27, 2015

http://www.reuters.com/

MELBOURNE – Oct 27 South Korea’s POSCO may build and help arrange financing for a graphite project in Tanzania being developed by Magnis Resources , as the Australian explorer races to start producing from the east African site by 2017.

Demand for graphite is expected to soar as it is a major ingredient in lithium-ion batteries for hybrid vehicles and wind and solar energy storage, with appetite for greener transport and energy booming.

Magnis said on Tuesday it had signed a memorandum of understanding that could see POSCO Engineering & Construction arrange debt from lenders it has ties with for the $210 million Nachu project, as well as coming up with a fixed-price bid by mid-2016 to build the mine and processing plant.

“The quality of the graphite at Nachu is the best in the world and with the huge demand in the battery market, we are excited to be involved with Magnis,” POSCO E&C mining plant business group director Peter Lim said in a statement put out by Magnis.

Big miners kick the empire building habit – by James Wilson (Financial Times – October 26, 2015)

October 27, 2015

http://www.ft.com/

BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto are being forced to curb their spending amid China’s economic slowdown

When the chief executive of one of the world’s biggest mining groups had to find words to describe his industry’s litany of problems, he turned to a US country song with an apt title: If You Are Going Through Hell.

“If you’re goin’ through hell keep on going,” were the lyrics recited by Freeport-McMoRan’s Richard Adkerson at a London reception this month, as his Arizona-based company battles a plummeting copper price and burdensome debts. “Don’t slow down, if you’re scared don’t show it . . . you might get out before the devil even knows you’re there.”

Forget the devil: mining investors are only too aware that the sector is a long way from paradise. The industry’s fortunes have deteriorated significantly since the end of the commodities “supercycle” — a big upward shift in demand driven by China’s post-2000 emergence as a manufacturing superpower.

Aluminum prices down, output up, trade tensions boil over – by Andy Home (Reuters U.S. – October 26, 2015)

October 27, 2015

http://www.reuters.com/

LONDON – Aluminum touched a new six-year low of $1,479 per tonne in London last week.

It’s now trading at levels close to those seen during the depths of the Global Financial Crisis, when the London Metal Exchange (LME) three-month price fell briefly as far as $1,279 in February 2009.

And if you think that’s bad, the situation in China is even worse. The front-month contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE) closed Friday at 10,580 yuan per tonne, within spitting distance of the December 2008 trough of 10,040 yuan.

Basis the most liquid SHFE contract though, the price has already fallen far further than the 2008-2009 low of 13,665 yuan. At such depressed price levels, around 90 percent of China’s huge aluminum smelter sector is operating at a loss, according to consultancy AZ China.

Risk-Taking Miners Work Through Civil Wars for Africa Gold Boom – by Thomas Biesheuvel and Kevin Crowley (Bloomberg News – October 27, 2015)

October 27, 2015

http://www.bloomberg.com/

When rebel soldiers overthrew the Mali government in 2012, coup leader Amadou Konare closed the border to everyone except the employees of Randgold Resources Ltd.

It’s pretty clear why. The company’s Loulo-Gounkoto and Morila mines were producing about 700,000 ounces of gold annually, valued at almost $1.2 billion. Randgold’s tax bill made it the biggest contributor to Mali’s economy. To keep the cash flowing, the new government quickly issued permits so workers could fly bullion out of the country to sell it on global markets.

“When you pay tax, you’re paying rent, and when you pay rent, the landlord doesn’t kick you out,” said Mark Bristow, Randgold’s chief executive officer, adding that his company delivers enough cash to Mali’s government to fund the entire civil-service payroll annually.

Africa has become the gold industry’s biggest growth story, despite the increased risks posed by political upheavals like a coup in Niger, Ivory Coast’s civil war or the Arab spring protests that spanned from Egypt to Morocco.

Coal country unruffled by strip mining in flourishing Egypt Valley – by Geoff Williams (America AlJazeera – October 26, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://america.aljazeera.com/

Despite blow to Ohio wildlife, locals see environmental upside, are more concerned with fracking in their backyards

PIEDMONT, Ohio — The Egypt Valley Wildlife Area is a tribute to what can happen after land is strip-mined of its coal and restored to nature. The area, state-owned land in eastern Ohio, is 18,011 acres of rolling hills, wetlands and grasslands. There is the 2,270-acre Piedmont Lake, popular with boaters and campers, and as one would expect in a wildlife area, there is wildlife. River otters were introduced in 1993, and black bears have made their home there, among the deer and wild turkeys.

For decades, this land was strip-mined for coal. But in the 1990s, Ohio began purchasing the land, transforming it into a magnet for animals, birdwatchers, hikers, hunters, fishermen and tourists.

However, much of the state’s and nature’s hard work is now at risk, ever since July, when the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) granted the Oxford Mining Co. a permit to strip-mine coal there. The company plans to mine underneath 741 acres for coal and to surface-mine 200 acres.

PGMs are the unchallenged metals of future – by Roger Baxter (MiningMx.com – October 26, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://www.miningmx.com/

Roger Baxter is CEO of the Chamber of Mines of South Africa.

[miningmx.com] – WHILE platinum and its other group metals grapple with current price weaknesses and market difficulties, it can be all-too easy to overlook the metals’ longer-term prospects in this world of rapid technological advance. In my view, platinum group metals (PGMs) are the unchallenged metals of the future.

Let’s start with their contribution to ‘greening’ the environment.

I am not going to comment on the fracas surrounding the Volkswagen’s issue. What I would like to remind everyone of is that – on average and because of PGM catalytic converters – emissions from 100 cars sold in 2015 are the equivalent of one car sold in the 1960s.

PGM vehicle emission catalysts are so successful that they convert 99% of combustion engine pollutants such as HC, CO, NOx and particulates to harmless outputs.

[Africa mining sector] Huge Potential, Wrong Time? – by Jade Davenport (World Policy.org – October 26, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://www.worldpolicy.org/

Africa’s mining sector has proven to be something of a mixed blessing. The continent’s mineral resources offer enormous possibilities of wealth, but they are also hard to reach. Sub-Saharan Africa, along with the inhospitable Arctic, remains the most underexplored region on earth, geologically speaking. Yet the continent accounts for approximately 30 percent of the world’s mineral reserves.

The geographical and logistical difficulties involved in locating and accessing Africa’s resource wealth have been exacerbated by the constrained post-2008 macroeconomic climate. Investors have been reluctant to fund new projects in far-flung geographies despite the rich rewards such projects offer in the medium to long term.

One lingering consequence of the 2008 global financial crisis has been that equity markets have largely closed up, says Wickus Botha, a mining and metals expert at EY, an accounting and professional services firm. Companies in high-risk, long-term industries such as mining have a harder time finding funding. This applies even more for projects in more remote regions.

Two factors have compounded the decline of interest in mining investment, Botha says.

Myanmar jade mining drives rights abuses, disasters, war-rights group – by Alisa Tang (Reuters India – October 23, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://in.reuters.com/

BANGKOK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Myanmar’s secretive jade industry – run by military elites, drug lords and crony companies – is fuelling armed conflict, land grabs, deadly landslides and floods in northern Kachin state, the rights group Global Witness said on Friday.

Jade is driving conflict between the government and ethnic Kachin rebels, funding both sides in a war that has killed thousands of people and displaced 100,000 since 2011, the London-based organisation said in a 128-page report.

Kachin’s Hpakant township has been stripped of forests, as two-storey-tall machines and dynamite take just four days to plough through jade-bearing mountains that once took 30 days to mine, leaving a “moonscape” of waste-filled craters prone to collapse, it said.

The loss of land, pollution and takeover of the jade industry by government-licensed companies have destroyed traditional sources of income – farming and small-scale mining – and stoked resentment in a volatile region, it said.

“Locals are literally having the ground cut from under their feet. There is a parallel social collapse involving endemic drug addiction amongst miners, prostitution and gambling,” Mike Davis, Asia director for Global Witness, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an email from Yangon.

India a factor in diamond trade migration from Antwerp to Dubai – by Kunal Bose (Business Standard – October 26, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://www.business-standard.com/

Earlier, the rough diamond cutting and polishing business had moved from Antwerp to Surat in Gujarat and a few other places, due to cost considerations

For gem traders and jewellery makers over the world, Dubai remains an important trade centre for pearls. But, of late, a growing portion of trade in rough diamonds is getting shifted from the Belgian port city of Antwerp to Dubai, a constituent of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Earlier, the rough diamond cutting and polishing business had moved from Antwerp to Surat in Gujarat and a few other places, due to cost considerations.

Business in rough, is now being squeezed out of the diamond district of Antwerp, which accommodates a World Diamond Centre and four trading exchanges, as dealers are finding it difficult to get bank funding. The big blow to dealers there, mostly Jews and Indians, came when Antwerp Diamond Bank (ADB) started the process of winding up operations globally, leaving a big gap in trade funding.

ADB used to make available around $1.5 billion to the trade. Also, toughening of banking regulations and non-governmental organisations doubting the effectiveness of the Kimberley Process Certification scheme (KPCS) in stopping all ‘blood diamonds’ finding their way into the legal market have made some other banks curb lending to the trade.

South Africa Plans First Mine Investment in Congo Since 2010 – by Franz Wild Thomas Wilson (Bloomberg News – October 26, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://www.bloomberg.com/

South Africa’s Industrial Development Corp. said it plans to buy a stake in Alphamin Resources Corp., its first investment in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s mining industry since a dispute over a canceled project in 2010.

Alphamin temporarily suspended its stock from trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Monday, before saying in a statement that it was in “advanced negotiations” for the Johannesburg-based IDC to invest in its Congolese unit. No shares were traded after the resumption, leaving the company valued at about C$71 million ($54 million).

“No definitive agreements have been entered into in respect of the financing and there can be no assurance that the financing will be completed,” the company said.

Alphamin is developing the Bisie tin mine in Congo’s eastern North Kivu province, where armed groups have controlled the area’s biggest mine on and off for years.

Camp Concern: Activists reunite for anti-uranium mining protest 40 years later inside Kakadu – by Emilia Terzon and Lisa Pellegrino (Australian Broadcasting Corporation – October 26, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://www.abc.net.au/

As uranium mining near Kakadu faces an uncertain future, activists calling themselves Camp Concern have reunited inside the Northern Territory park to mark 40 years on from the launch of an anti-mining protest.

Camp Concern was an anti-uranium mining protest camp that started with five people on October 26, 1975, on land now encompassed by the World Heritage-listed Kakadu National Park.

The camp ended up witnessing hundreds of participants, before being disbanded after four years. The Ranger Uranium Mine was controversially completed in 1980.

Camp Concern founding member Hip Strider was among those who returned to the original protest site at the weekend. “We’re having a gathering to celebrate,” Mr Strider said.

Essar plant rises amid industry decline – by John Myers (Duluth News Tribune – October 25, 2015)

October 26, 2015

http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/

NASHWAUK — On a brisk, breezy October day, 18 big cranes reached for the sky over the sprawling Essar Steel Minnesota taconite plant just north of town where more than 700 construction workers were on the job.

Iron beams and steel siding hung from cables as ironworkers in bucket-lifts grabbed dangling pieces and secured them into place, players in what looked like the world’s largest erector set.

The first thing that strikes the eye is the size of the project — everything about the work is big — from the 240-ton capacity ore-hauling trucks being readied to the massive building that will house the taconite-baking furnaces and the hulking, 9-story-deep underground concrete edifice where boulders of raw ore will be crushed to a useable size.

The $1.9 billion taconite mine and processing plant is among the largest and most expensive construction projects in Minnesota history.