Twitter

Iron Ore

Nunavut hunters urge for reassessment as Baffinland eyes 2026 construction of Steensby rail – by Samuel Wat (CBC News North – April 01, 2025)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/

The project was approved more than a decade ago. Hunters say a lot has changed since then

Baffinland Iron Mines is now looking at 2026 as a start date for its proposed expansion to an iron ore mine in Nunavut, but local hunters are calling for the project to be reassessed before it can go ahead. The mining company wants to ship iron ore from its existing Mary River mine, by building a railway south to a proposed port at Steensby Inlet.

It’s a plan that was approved by the federal government in 2012. For years, it was put on the back burner with Baffinland favouring a railway to be built from the mine north to Milne Inlet — an option it said would be less costly. That was rejected by the federal government in 2022, causing Baffinland to switch back to the Steensby Inlet track.

Read more

Column: Massive Simandou mine can end Australia’s golden iron ore age, or start new one – by Clyde Russell (Reuters – February 25, 2025)

https://www.reuters.com/

The term gamechanger is often over used enough to be rendered meaningless, but the huge Simandou mine in the West African country of Guinea is going to be just that as its start up is set to rock the seaborne iron ore market.

The first cargoes from the project may arrive by the end of this year and it’s expected that it will ramp up to its full capacity of 120 million metric tons per annum fairly quickly. The four blocks of Simandou are impressive in their scale and infrastructure challenges, boasting a 620 kilometre (384 mile) rail line, a new port with dedicated trans-shipment vessels that will load bulk carriers offshore.

Read more

[ Andrew Forrest] A Mining Billionaire’s Case for Ditching Fossil Fuels – by Justin Worland (Time Magazine – February 25, 2025)

https://time.com/

It does not take long at lunch with Andrew Forrest for him to start seeming less like an Australian mining billionaire and more like a climate activist–meets–zealous prosecutor. His rugged features quickly appear not to reflect the arid expanse of Western Australia’s Pilbara region, home to the core operations of his $38 billion Fortescue iron-ore business.

Rather, they appear the result of a succession of high-stakes court battles. When we meet at a luxurious Paris brasserie, he speaks passionately about a client that he’s been representing for several years: the planet. His case? Corporate bosses must act now—and act fast—to tackle climate change, an argument he delivers with force and the unrivaled credibility that comes from decades in the carbon-spewing industry.

Read more

Severe Cyclone Makes Landfall Near Australia’s Iron Ore Hub – by Keira Wright and Paul-Alain Hunt (Bloomberg News/Financial Post – February 13, 2025)

https://financialpost.com/

Severe Cyclone Zelia has made landfall near Australia’s iron ore export hub, bringing heavy rainfall and damaging wind gusts, with the system threatening big mines and crucial rail links as it tracks inland.

(Bloomberg) — Severe Cyclone Zelia has made landfall near Australia’s iron ore export hub, bringing heavy rainfall and damaging wind gusts, with the system threatening big mines and crucial rail links as it tracks inland.

The powerful cyclone crossed the coast to the east of Port Hedland, the nation’s biggest iron ore export harbor, packing very destructive wind gusts of up to 290 kilometers (180 miles) per hour near its center, according to the Bureau of Meteorology. Winds that strong flatten structures and buckle power lines.

Read more

Labrador stuck in ‘wait-and-see’ approach over looming impact of U.S. steel tariffs – by Elizabeth Whitten (CBC News Newfoundland-Labrador – February 14, 2025)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/

Labrador mines produce components used in steel manufacturing

In the wake of newly announced U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, one Labrador mayor says businesses in the mine-heavy region will have to wait and see how their bottom lines are impacted.

Last week, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a 30-day reprieve for tariffs on Canadian goods, only to announce he was slapping a 25 per cent tariff on all of the country’s steel and aluminum imports, scheduled to come into effect on March 12.

Read more

Canada becomes a major iron ore producer – by Ailbhe Goodbody (CIM Magazine – January 17, 2025)

https://magazine.cim.org/en/

How the Labrador Trough became the epicentre of Canadian iron ore mining in the 1950s

The first reference to iron in the Labrador Trough, a geologic belt hosting world-class iron deposits that extends for approximately 1,100 kilometres through Labrador and Quebec, was made by Father Louis Babel, who travelled in the area from 1866 to 1870, according to H.E. Neal (Explor. Mining Geol., Vol. 9, No. 2, pp. 113-121, 2000). A.P. Low was the first geologist to recognize iron mineralization that was similar to that found in the northern United States while he was on a preliminary reconnaissance survey in 1893 to 1894.

“However, it was not until 1929 that the first iron ore discoveries were made by J.E. Gill and W. F. James in the Burnt Creek (Knob Lake) area,” wrote R.D. Westervelt (CIM Bulletin, November 1957). These iron ore discoveries led to the formation of the Labrador Mining and Exploration Company (LME) in 1936 to explore a 20,000-square-mile concession in Labrador, and of the Hollinger North Shore Exploration Company in 1941 to explore an adjoining 3,900-square-mile concession in Quebec.

Read more

The China commodities super-cycle is over. Will there be another boom? – by Leslie Hook, Joe Leahy and Wenjie Ding (Australian Financial Review – January 16, 2025)

https://www.afr.com/

China’s massive industrialisation and urbanisation drove a huge commodities boom that has run its course, but some executives are hopeful it will be replaced.

Waking from a nap at his desk, Xiao, a steel trader from Wuhan in central China, reflects on how, at the end of one of the greatest booms in recent economic history, he is a lucky survivor.

About half of his competitors in this gritty office park, built near the site of China’s first ironworks, have gone bust during the country’s three-year-long property crisis. The park itself is overshadowed by the enormous concrete skeleton of an unfinished real estate project.

Read more

Trump tariffs could lead to potential job losses in Labrador mines, expert says – by Alex Kennedy 9CBC News Newfoundland & Labrador – December 02, 2024)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/

Threats of a 25 per cent tariff sounded alarms in industries around the world

Threats of a 25 per cent tariff on goods exported from Canada into the United States have sounded alarms in industries around the world, including mining and those operating in Labrador. Tamer Elbokl, editor in chief of the Canadian Mining Journal, told CBC Radio Friday that any kind of tariff would be bad news on his industry.

“It will have a huge impact. Not just on iron ore, but all minerals exported from Canada to the United States,” Elbokl said. Canada was the world’s eighth largest producer of iron ore in 2023, with the majority of trade going to the United States.

Read more

Will we go back? Exploring the Edmund Fitzgerald wreck 49 years later – by Josh Berry (Fox 17 Online – November 10, 2024)

https://www.fox17online.com/

OTD in 1975: The SS Edmund Fitzgerald lost to the depths of Lake Superior

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — It’s part of Michigan and midwest lore. Lost to the depths of the Great Lakes, the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank on November 10, 49 years ago. We took a look back through the lens of a man who has laid eyes on the site himself.

“Because of the notoriety, because of the song from Gordon Lightfoot, everybody wants to know about the Edmund Fitzgerald,” said Ric Mixter. There aren’t many people better suited for answers on the wreckage than Ric Mixter. He’s published a 300-page book on the Fitzgerald, three documentaries, and a four-hour podcast.

Read more

November on the Great Lakes is deadly. The Edmund Fitzgerald and many others bear witness – by Jenna Prestininzi (Detroit Free Press – November 8, 2024)

https://www.freep.com/

Beware of the “gales of November” on the Great Lakes this month, as singer Gordon Lightfoot warned, because this month has been particularly deadly for sailors on the lakes for hundreds of years.

Over the last two centuries, more than 70 ships have plunged to their demise on the Great Lakes during November. Some, like the iron ore carrier the Edmund Fitzgerald, went down and took the entire crew down with them.

Read more

After many delays, $2B Iron Range project revives quest to create first new taconite mine since 1970s – by Mike Hughlett (Minnesota Star Tribune – November 2024)

https://www.startribune.com/

Mesabi Metallics lost critical state mineral leases last year, leaving an even bigger question mark over its half-built, controversial project in Nashwauk. But the company says it will finish the plant.

NASHWAUK, MINN. – An industrial resurrection seems afoot at a long-promising but snakebitten $2 billion-plus taconite project. On a crisp fall morning, a construction site in this Iron Range city teemed with workers aiming to complete a venture given up for dead by just about everybody but its owner, Mesabi Metallics.

After years of missed deadlines and financial failures, Mesabi last year permanently lost crucial state mineral leases. But Mesabi still controls private land leases in Nashwauk. And it has renewed construction of a project that was only half built when work shut down during a 2016 bankruptcy.

Read more

Liability trial for BHP in Samarco dam collapse begins in London – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – October 21, 2024)

https://www.mining.com/

BHP (ASX, NYSE: BHP) faces a potential $47 billion payout in damages over the 2015 Mariana Dam disaster in Brazil, believed to be country’s most catastrophic environmental incident, as a lawsuit against the miner kicked off on Monday in London’s High Court.

The trial, expected to last up to 12 weeks, will determine whether BHP is legally responsible for the collapse of the Fundão tailings dam in Minas Gerais, Brazil. The structure failure caused a massive flood that claimed 19 lives, destroyed villages and severely polluted water sources for local communities. The dam was owned by Samarco, a joint venture between BHP and Brazilian mining giant Vale.

Read more

Baffinland cuts 10% of workforce to focus on Steensby rail – by Samuel Wat (CBC News North – October 19, 2024)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/

Mining company will reduce amount of iron ore shipments out of Milne Inlet

Baffinland Iron Mines is laying off 10 per cent of its workforce in Nunavut due to weak iron ore prices. Senior adviser Paul Quassa said the company is diverting its resources to the $5.7-billion railroad from the Mary River Mine south to Steensby Inlet.

“We would be rationalizing our equipment and supplies… and reducing the number of permit fronts to concentrate folks on the Steensby authorization,” he said.

Read more

Column: Exuberant iron ore, subdued copper show different sides of China stimulus – by Clyde Russell (Reuters – October 2, 2024)

https://www.reuters.com/

China’s significant stimulus measures have kicked the prices of key metals higher, and the gains have largely been sustained even amid a debate as to whether Beijing has actually done enough to boost the world’s second-biggest economy.

The raft of announcements last week, which included lower interest rates and easier home purchase terms, saw metals prices respond, especially those with a high degree of China exposure, such as iron ore.

Read more

Iron Ore Spikes as Beijing Takes Slew of Steps to Aid Economy – by Jake Lloyd-Smith (Bloomberg News – September 23, 2024)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Iron ore and copper rallied strongly after China unveiled a series of measures to boost growth and resurrect its beleaguered property market.

China, the biggest consumer of metals and the main driver of the fortunes of those who produce them, has been a constant source of bad news for commodity markets this year. A broad economic slowdown, combined with the crisis in the property sector, has seen metal prices slump and piled pressure on everything from steelmakers to copper smelters.

Read more