Nickel – Page 47 – Republic of Mining

(Lynn Lake, Manitoba) Is this the next major nickel sulphide discovery? (MiningNew.net – February 12, 2021)

February 12, 2021

https://www.miningnews.net/

Lynn Lake is one of Canada’s largest nickel producing regions, having mined in the order of 22.2 million tons at 1% nickel and 0.5% copper between 1953 and 1976, when the bottom fell out of the nickel price and mining ceased.

In 2015 Corazon took the strategic step of consolidating the entire Lynn Lake nickel field under its ownership – the first time this world-scale nickel belt had been controlled by one company – and set about the systematic exploration of the project.

This has included multiple phases of drilling, supported by detailed targeting work, led by world-leading nickel sulphide expert Dr Larry Hulbert.

Vale commits $23 million for diamond drilling, other work related to Thompson mine extension project – by Ian Graham (Thompson Citizen – February 10, 2021)

February 11, 2021

https://www.thompsoncitizen.net/

Vale Manitoba’s proposed Thompson mine extension project doesn’t have the green light from the company’s board of directors just yet but $23 million has been allocated towards it over the next six months in an en effort to collect more information on which to base a final decision.

Some of the money will be spent on diamond drilling to try to determine the precise extent of the footwall deep and hanging wall ore body, Manitoba Operations general manager Franco Cazzola told the Thompson Chamber of Commerce at their Feb. 10 meeting.

“Our project right now sits at 50 per cent inferred and 50 per cent indicated [resources],” Cazzola said. “When you have an inferred resource … the ore body is not quite as well-defined as you’d like it to be and so in order to to that you actually have to do more diamond drilling, pull more cores.”

A rival for Sudbury? Company hopes to turn Timmins into the new nickel capital – by Colleen Romaniuk (Sudbury Star – February 10, 2021)

February 11, 2021

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

Canada Nickel Company describes its Crawford site as the largest nickel sulphide discovery since the 1970s

The CEO and Chairman of Canada Nickel Company told a Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce audience on Tuesday that it is coming for Sudbury’s Big Nickel.

The company is in the process of “aggressively advancing” its Crawford nickel-cobalt sulphide project about 40 kilometres north of Timmins, which it describes as the largest nickel sulphide discovery since the early 1970s.

As part of the ongoing project, Canada Nickel recently launched a subsidiary called NetZero Metals to begin research and development on a processing facility that could produce zero-carbon nickel, cobalt, and iron products.

Could Timmins become Northern Ontario’s new nickel capital? – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – February 9, 2021)

February 11, 2021

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

A nickel supercycle is set to begin, thanks to Elon Musk, and Canada Nickel wants to be first to production

An upstart mine developer wouldn’t mind having Timmins knock off Sudbury among the world’s leading nickel mining camps.

Canada Nickel Company chair and CEO Mark Selby thinks his Crawford nickel sulphide deposit is a “global-scale” discovery with multi-million-tonne potential that could be a robust producer for generations.

Selby explained in a Feb. 9 web presentation to a Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce audience of the sudden emergence of the Crawford Project in the historic Timmins gold and base metal mining camp.

Nornickel fined $2 billion for massive Arctic fuel spill – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – February 5, 2021)

February 8, 2021

https://www.mining.com/

Norilsk Nickel (MCX: GMKN), the world’s largest producer of palladium and nickel, will have to pay a record fine of 146 billion rubles ($1.94 billion) in compensation for a huge fuel spill in the Arctic last May, a Russian court ruled on Friday.

The amount, while in line with a demand by the nation’s environmental watchdog Rosprirodnadzor, more than doubles what Russia is seeking to get in mineral extraction tax from mining companies this year.

“We won!!!” Rosprirodnadzor head Svetlana Rodionova, who was in the courtroom on Friday, said in an Instagram post. “Ecology is everyone’s business!!!”

Explainer: How the New Caledonia government collapse may affect the nickel market – by Mai Nguyen (Yahoo Finance – February 4, 2021)

February 4, 2021

https://finance.yahoo.com/

HANOI – The coalition government in New Caledonia, a French territory in the Pacific that is the world’s fourth-largest nickel ore producer, collapsed on Tuesday after pro-independence politicians resigned.

Riots broke out in December sparked by protests led by pro-independence political parties over the sale of Vale SA’s nickel business in the country.

Here is what that means for the global market for the metal used to make stainless steel and batteries for electric vehicles.

HOW BIG A NICKEL PRODUCER IS NEW CALEDONIA?

Scrap metal company must pay for buying stolen nickel worth millions, Manitoba judge rules – by Cameron MacLean (CBC News Manitoba – February 1, 2021)

February 2, 2021

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

A Manitoba metal recycling company is on the hook after buying hundreds of thousands of pounds of stolen nickel worth millions of dollars, a judge ruled.

Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Shauna McCarthy awarded mining company Vale Canada Ltd. a summary judgment against Urbanmine, Inc., which purchased and resold 483,396 pounds of nickel stolen from a compound in Thompson, Man., over the course of nearly 10 months between July 2012 and May 2013.

In her decision on Aug. 27, 2020, McCarthy also awarded Vale a default judgment against the Schwartz Bros. construction company and a number of its employees, all but one of whom pled guilty to criminal charges related to the thefts and were ordered to pay restitution.

Contract talks ‘long and hard,’ Mine Mill says, but members approve contract – by Jim Moodie (Sudbury Star – February 2, 2021)

February 2, 2021

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

The leader of a union representing Glencore workers said he was comfortable with the tentative deal reached over the weekend on a new contract, although it would up to the workers to decide.

And they did Monday, voting in favour of the new contract by a 67.8 per cent again. “The bargaining was very long and hard — many long nights,” said Eric Boulay, vice-president and acting president of Mine Mine Local 598/Unifor. “Our committee is confident they reached the most fair agreement that could be reached at this point.”

One of the sticking points in the talks, which went throughout the weekend, was a concession the company wanted regarding benefits, “but we were able to get that off the table,” said Boulay.

Provincial consultation deadline pushed back for two proposed roads in Ring of Fire (CBC News Thunder Bay – January 27, 2021)

January 27, 2021

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/

The Ontario government says it has heard concerns from Indigenous communities about the challenges of consulting on proposed developments for two access roads into the Ring of Fire area, and have extended deadlines for both projects after pushback from some First Nations in the area.

Both the Webequie supply road and the Marten Falls community access road are working their way through the province’s environmental assessment process. That process will answer the questions of if, when and how work can proceed on the proposed developments.

Webequie and Marten Falls have each submitted their terms of reference — or the roadmap laying out how the proposed projects should be studied during the environmental assessment — to the provincial government and are awaiting its approval before the studies can begin.

All the mines Tesla needs to build 20 million cars a year – by Frik Els (Mining.com – January 27, 2021)

January 27, 2021

https://www.mining.com/

Elon Musk and his merry band of executive vice presidents had plenty of advice for the mining and metals industry at the company’s Battery Day event in September, where the road map to a $25,000 Tesla was laid out.

How easy it is to mine lithium (just add salt), just how much of it there is in Nevada (enough for 300 million EVs), how to be environmentally friendly (“put the chunk of dirt back where it was”) and, given these facts, why miners haven’t been trying harder.

Since lithium is “just like widely available” and Tesla’s scientists have eliminated other hard to come by metals like graphite (replace it with sand, obvs) and cobalt from batteries (at least in theory), Musk’s prime raw material worry is nickel.

[Kabanga Nickel/Tanzania] Green technology boost for African mining – by Martin Creamer (MiningWeekly.com – January 26, 2021)

January 27, 2021

https://www.miningweekly.com/

JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The key to unlocking value of Kabanga Nickel and enabling the full beneficiation of new era metals in Tanzania is an environment-friendly hydrometallurgy process that eliminates smelting and thus slashes the need for electricity.

The Kabanga Nickel Hydromet process – which takes ore to refined metals at lower capital and operating costs cutting carbon dioxide (CO2) emission by 80% and eliminating sulphur dioxide (SO2) emission altogether – is seen as a game changer for Tanzania, by providing the maximum in-country value-add to the East African nation.

Once developed, Kabanga will produce class 1 nickel and cobalt products – two of the key elements used in electric vehicle (EV) batteries – and London Metal Exchange grade A copper cathode.

Silver Elephant acquires nickel project in Thompson belt – by Mariaan Webb (MiningWeekly.com – January 25, 2021)

January 25, 2021

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Toronto-listed Silver Elephant has high hopes and aspirations for its new Minago project, in Manitoba, which could supply the “insatiable” demand for Class 1 nickel from the electric vehicle (EV) industry.

The company announced on Friday that it had entered into a binding agreement to acquire the project, located in the Thompson nickel belt (TNB), from Victory Nickel for $11.68-million, consisting of $6.68-million in credit against secured debt owed to Silver Elephant and $5-million in shares.

“The Minago acquisition immediately propels Silver Elephant to the forefront of the nickel sulphite mining space to supply much needed Class 1 nickel for long-range, high-intensity, fast charging NMC 811 (80% nickel, 10% manganese, 10% cobalt) cathode standard in lithium batteries to fuel mass EV adoption,” Silver Elephant’s VP exploration and Canadian operations, Dan Oosterman, said in a statement.

Nickel rally being fuelled by batteries ‘hype’, analysts warn – by Henry Sanderson (Financial Times – January 2021)

January 25, 2021

https://www.ft.com/

Metal up 70% since last March despite forecasts that supply will continue to exceed demand

Nickel’s dramatic rally is being fed by “hype” over electric vehicles and faces a challenge from new sources of supply in the coming years, traders and analysts have warned.

The price of nickel on the London Metal Exchange has risen by about 70 per cent since its low last March to $18,410 a tonne, as speculators bet it will benefit from rising sales of electric vehicles — which are increasingly using batteries with a higher nickel content.

Forecasts of sharp EV growth, encouraged by policymakers’ push for a “green” recovery, have lifted a range of input metals in recent months, including copper and lithium.

Kabanga, Tanzania to develop world’s largest nickel deposit – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – January 19, 2021)

January 19, 2021

https://www.mining.com/

British miner Kabanga Nickel, formerly known as LZ Nickel, has inked a framework agreement with the government of Tanzania to develop the world’s largest battery-grade nickel sulphide deposit, in the country’s northwestern.

As part of the deal, the parties have created a joint company called Tembo Nickel Corp., which will mine, process and refine class 1 nickel with cobalt and copper co-products.

Kabanga Nickel is the new entity’s majority owner with an 84% stake. Tanzania owns the remaining 16%, which is the government’s usual stake in all of the country’s mining projects.

Metals Behind EV Revolution to Resume Volatile Rally – Again – by Annie Lee and Eddie Spence (Bloomberg News – January 14, 2021)

January 15, 2021

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Battery metals are set to rebound this year as an electric-vehicle boom is bolstered by post-pandemic push for a green economic recovery.

U.S. President-elect Joe Biden has indicated the sector could get a boost, while China wants new energy vehicles to account for about 20% of total new car sales by 2025. Germany has extended subsidies on EVs for an extra four years, and the U.K. will ban sales of new petrol and diesel cars from 2030.

The markets for metals such as lithium and cobalt, which soared in 2018 before slumping on concerns about oversupply, will be underpinned by a step change in battery demand. Global EV sales are projected to surge 60% this year, according to BloombergNEF.