Mining company RNC and its joint venture (JV) partner Waterton are ready to accelerate discussions with potential participants to advance the Dumont nickel/cobalt project – tipped to be one of Canada’s largest base metals mines – to construction, CEO Mark Selby reported on Thursday.
This comes as RNC published a “milestone” update to its 2013 feasibility study for Dumont, which ranks the Quebec-based $1-billion project among the top-five sulphide nickel producers globally.
With initial production of 33 000 t/y, ramping up to 50 000 t/y in the Phase 2 expansion, Dumont would produce about 1.2-million tonnes (2.6-billion pounds) of nickel concentrate over three decades, at a life-of-mine cash cost of $3.22/lb nickel and an all-in sustaining cost of $3.80/lb payable nickel.
Osisko Mining (TSX: OSK) has found a new and shallow gold zone about 350 metres north of the main deposit at its Windfall property in Quebec, one of the highest grade resource-stage gold projects in Canada.
The mineralization occurs between a vertical depth from surface of between 50 metres and 275 metres and is open at depth and along strike.
Highlights include 393 grams gold per tonne over 2.2 metres starting from 100 metres downhole in OSK-W-19-1883 and 31 grams gold over 6.1 metres starting from 211 metres downhole in OSK-W-1911.
Company wants to build 185-kilometre road south from Kuujjuaq
Organizations representing Inuit in Nunavik and in the comunity of Kuujjuaq have signed a letter of intent with a junior mining company that wants to build a 185-kilometre haul road south from Kuujjuaq to an open pit rare earths mine.
Maggie Emudluk, Makivik Corp.’s vice-president for economic development, and Sammy Koneak, the president of the Nayumivik Landholding Corp., signed the letter of intent on May 15 with Vancouver-based Commerce Resources Corp. A Makivik Corp, spokesperson said the letter of intent creates a committee that will provide answers to concerns and questions from people in Kuujjuaq.
“The Ashram deposit project is still in a pre-development phase and has to go through several stages prior to getting formal Inuit acceptance to be implemented,” the Makivik spokesperson said.
Stornoway Diamond Corp. is racing to stave off insolvency as it deals with a decline in gem prices that has prevented the Canadian miner from generating positive free cash flow this year.
Longueuil, Que.-based Stornoway said Tuesday it is in talks with backers to secure its long-term financial viability. At the same time, the company launched a major cost-cutting effort and strategic review, which could mean putting itself up for sale.
“We have a cash crunch so that’s why we need to look at our options,” Stornoway chief executive Patrick Godin said in an interview with The Globe and Mail, adding that although diamond pricing is soft at the moment, he remains confident it will recover as global supply decreases over the next several years. “Given the quality of the asset that we have, we just need to resist during the tough times to be able to take the wave.”
High-profile investments by Agnico Eagle Mines (TSX: AEM; NYSE: AEM) in two new Nunavut gold operations will drastically alter the company’s production profile with the onset of commercial production later this year.
However, perhaps lost in the excitement is that its core operations in Quebec — La Ronde, Canadian Malartic and Goldex — are also expected to expand. Help on the regulatory front from Quebec Premier François Legault, whose Coalition Avenir Quebec government took office last October, could speed up the process.
Currently, “start-ups take longer and are more complicated because we have to get approvals at the federal and provincial levels,” said Christian Provencher, Agnico Eagle’s vice-president for Canada, in an interview. The Coalition Avenir Quebec government, whose electoral base is concentrated in the province’s regions, has committed to reviewing the situation.
Nemaska Lithium (TSE: NMX) announced on Monday it has terminated a multi-year supply agreement with Livent Corporation that would cost the Quebec company up to $20m to settle.
The deal with Livent, spun out of US lithium major FMC Corp last year, saw Nemaska provide up to 8,000 tonnes per year (28,000 tonnes in total during the term of the contract) of lithium carbonate starting in April this year.
According to a press released late on Monday, Nemaska told Livent it “might have no option but to terminate” the agreement and repay Livent the USD$10 million the it received in April 2017 “plus a similar amount as a termination fee”.
Nemaska Lithium’s (TSE: NMX) stock plummeted Wednesday after disclosing it has been forced to revise the budget for the Whabouchi lithium mine and Shawinigan electrochemical plant upward by C$375 million. The company, with a $300 million market cap on the TSX, clawed back some of the early day’s losses, but still closed the day down 35%.
Nemaska, which has also received funding from the Quebec provincial and Canadian federal governments, is building the Whabouchi hard rock lithium mine in the James Bay region and Shawinigan processing plant north of Montreal, aiming to put Canada on the global lithium production map.
Nemaska has already spent over $138 million on the Whabouchi mine and mill, and another $67.3 million for the plant in Shawinigan. The additional funding is largely related to installation and indirect costs, said the company. Direct purchase package costs – mainly equipment – are in line with the original budget.
Nemaska arranged a $1-billion financing to build a Quebec mine in the nick of time, while massive share price declines put other explorers’ projects out of reach
For a brief window of time, after Nemaska Lithium Inc.’s cafeteria went up in flames last week and the company halted construction of its mine in Quebec, questions swirled about what would happen next.
By Thursday, however, Nemaska’s workers were eating in a new cafeteria, operations resumed and the company’s investors were hardly burned — its stock barely down and trading at 60 cents — compared to everyone else in the lithium market.
Lithium — a key component in the batteries used in electric vehicles — started 2018 on a high note as prices for the metal drove investments in dozens of junior explorers.
Wind turbines and compressed air energy storage to displace diesel at Raglan and Hope Bay
The federal government is investing $4.2 million in two renewable energy projects in Quebec and Nunavut to reduce reliance on fossil fuels at mines in Canada’s north.
Both projects will be managed by Tugliq Energy Corporation, a renewable energy company focused on remote regions.
The projects will be funded through Natural Resources Canada’s Energy Innovation Program, said Paul Lefebvre, the parliamentary secretary to Canada’s Minister of Natural Resources, at the Association for Mineral Exploration British Columbia’s (AME) Roundup conference in Vancouver on Monday.
The Canadian Mining Hall of Fame was conceived by the late Maurice R. Brown, former editor and publisher of The Northern Miner, as a way to recognize and honour the legendary mine finders and builders of a great Canadian industry. The Hall was established in 1988. For more information about the extraordinary individuals who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame, please go to their home website: http://mininghalloffame.ca/
James Gill secured a place in mining history through the exceptional success and staying power of Aur Resources. In 1981, he made a timely decision to launch his own company and begin the hunt for projects with potential to become producing mines. With a PhD in economic geology and early career experience with senior companies, he brought strong technical skills and a disciplined approach to corporate management to his newly incorporated junior.
Aur began life with $250,000 of seed capital, which Gill parlayed into a large land package in Quebec’s Val d’Or mining camp. Aur became a modest-sized gold producer through discoveries and mine acquisitions, but the big breakthrough came in 1989 with the Louvicourt copper-zinc discovery. Gill’s entrepreneurial energy came to the fore as Louvicourt was developed into one of Canada’s premier copper-zinc mines. He continued to develop and acquire mines in Canada and abroad until 2007, when he negotiated a $4.1 billion buyout of Aur by Teck Resources.
http://www.pendaproductions.com/ This video was produced by PENDA Productions, a full service production company specializing in Corporate Communications with a focus on Corporate Responsibility.
Mining was part of Gill’s DNA, as his grandfather James E. Gill (a 2003 CMHF inductee) was a successful consulting geologist and an influential professor of economic geology at McGill University. Born in Montreal, James W. Gill is a McGill graduate with a BSc degree (1971) and a MSc degree (1976). He also earned a PhD from Carleton University in Ottawa.
(LtoR) James W. Gill receiving the award from Anthony Vaccaro, CMHF Director and Group Publisher, The Northern Miner Group at the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame dinner on January 10th. Keith Houghton Photography.
(Reuters) – Anglo-Australian miner Rio Tinto (RIO.L) (RIO.AX) is preparing to take its Iron Ore Company of Canada business public in the first half of 2019 by dual-listing it in New York and Toronto, people familiar with the situation told Reuters.
The company has hired investment banks Royal Bank of Canada (RY.TO), Credit Suisse (CSGN.S) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N) to lead the IPO, according to sources who spoke on condition of anonymity as the information is not public.
Rio Tinto, the world’s second-biggest listed miner, is targeting a valuation of about $4 billion, they said. While Rio did not see much traction with a sale process, it has not ruled that out, the people said.
Alcoa Corp. will further curtail production at a Canadian smelter as the biggest U.S. aluminum producer faces a shortage of workers amid a dispute with unionized workers and the impact of U.S. tariffs on shipments of the metal.
The Pittsburgh-based company said it will curtail half of the one operating potline’s 138,000 metric ton capacity at its majority-owned Aluminerie de Bécancour Inc. smelter in Quebec. Alcoa attributed the cut to recent departures and retirements of salaried employees, who were already working extra shifts since the producer locked out more than 1,000 union employees on Jan. 11.
The move is the latest twist in a labor dispute that started over pensions and recruitment rules, but turned into a deadlock that shut the smelter’s two other potlines. Prior to Wednesday’s announcement, Bloomberg Intelligence senior analyst Andrew Cosgrove estimated that the lockout at Becancour could curtail 280 000 t this year from the global market.
Quebec-focused exploration and early-development company Troilus has significantly expanded its land position through the acquisition of the Troilus North project, located north-east of the Val-d’Or mining district.
The Toronto-based company is focused on restarting the former Troilus mine, which Inmet Mining operated as an openpit between 1997 and 2010, producing more than two-million ounces of gold and almost 70 000 t of copper.
TSX-listed Troilus will acquire the Troilus North project from Emgold Mining for 3.75-million shares and C$250 000 in cash. The cash component will absolve a bridge loan previously advanced.
The 500 residents of La Motte, Que., don’t have have a gas station or even a convenience store, but they do enjoy some of the best-tasting drinking water in North America. So when an Australian mining firm began seeking approval to build an open-air lithium mine just a stone’s throw from the community’s water source, reactions were decidedly mixed in the town, located 50 kilometres northwest of Val-d’Or.
Some were eager for the 132 jobs the company, Sayona, is promising to create. La Motte’s town council unanimously passed a motion in July endorsing the project. Others, though, are concerned about the proposed mine’s proximity to the Saint-Mathieu-Lac-Berry esker, the 8,000-year-old ridge of stratified sand and gravel that naturally filters rain and snow in the Abitibi-Témiscamingue region of northern Quebec.
Residents have struggled to get answers about the environmental risks of a project that would rip a hole — 1,000 metres long, 600 metres wide and 200 metres deep — into the terrain.
Innu launched the lawsuit in 2013, seeking $900 million in compensation
The Supreme Court of Canada says it will hear an appeal over jurisdiction in the latest stage of a long-running effort by Innu First Nations to sue mining giant Rio Tinto.
The government of Newfoundland and Labrador launched the appeal after Quebec’s highest court ruled that the Innu of Uashat and of Mani-Utenam and others could sue the company and its Iron Ore Co. of Canada subsidiary through Quebec courts.
The attorney general of Newfoundland and Labrador has argued that Quebec courts are without jurisdiction in the matter because the mining operations are in Labrador.
