Twitter

Teck signals it’s open to deal with Glencore around combining QB2 and Collahuasi copper mines – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – February 21, 2025)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Teck Resources Ltd. chief executive Jonathan Price indicated he is open to a tie-up with former foe Glencore PLC that would combine its giant QB2 copper mine in Chile with Glencore’s neighbouring Collahuasi operation.

QB2 is the mine that underpinned Teck’s revamp to become a fully focused critical-minerals company after it sold its legacy coal business to Glencore. Glencore co-owns another giant copper mine near QB2 called Collahuasi. Billions in cost savings are potentially on the table if QB2 and Collahuasi can be brought under the same ownership and operated as one gigantic facility.

Read more

Mining the Northwest: Indigenous business group calls for greater consent in mine planning – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – February 19, 2025)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Anishnawbe Business Professional Association proposes new framework that follows the path of reconciliation

Jason Rasevych would like to see corporate Canada do more to put into practice what they put on paper. The president of the Anishnawbe Business Professional Association (ABPA) notices that mining companies often make statements in their annual sustainability reports about how they’re working progressively with First Nation communities.

Most of it is centred around promises of jobs and business opportunities. What’s missed is how mining activity will impact a community’s culture. While companies often say they are committed to reconciliation, Rasevych asks, “How are they reporting on that each and every year?”

Read more

After Chinese company divested from Calgary lithium firm, mystery firm stepped in – by Darryl Greer (Canadian Press/CBC News Calgary – February 20, 2025)

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

Application filed for order directing Gator Capital Ltd. to dispose of shares in Lithium Chile

The federal government is going to court to force a Toronto company to sell a $34-million stake in a Calgary-based lithium firm that it bought off a Chinese company.

The government had already deemed the previous Chinese owner’s investment in Lithium Chile Inc. to be harmful to national security, and it says in a Federal Court application that the new buyer has failed to co-operate with efforts to prove it isn’t owned or influenced by China’s government either.

Read more

Top leadership changes in New Caledonia’s nickel stakeholder – by Patrick Decloitre (Radio New Zealand – February 20, 2025)

https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/

French mining giant Eramet has announced major changes in its leadership. The company is a major stakeholder in New Caledonia’s nickel industry, being the owner of Société Le Nickel (SLN), the French territory’s oldest nickel mine and smelter operator.

Eramet’s current chair/chief executive Christel Bories will relinquish her CEO position, only to retain her role as chair. The changes are expected to become effective at Eramet’s shareholder’s general meeting, scheduled on 27 May, Eramet said in a release. The new director general/CEO will be Paulo Castellari.

Read more

China-Backed $3 Billion Indonesia Nickel Smelter Risks Shutdown – by Eddie Spence and Alfred Cang (Bloomberg News/Financial Post – February 20, 2025)

https://financialpost.com/

One of the biggest nickel smelters in Indonesia has slashed production and is close to shutting down completely, just months after the collapse of its Chinese parent company.

(Bloomberg) — One of the biggest nickel smelters in Indonesia has slashed production and is close to shutting down completely, just months after the collapse of its Chinese parent company.

PT Gunbuster Nickel Industry, which is affiliated with bankrupted stainless steel giant Jiangsu Delong Nickel Industry Co., is delaying payments to local energy suppliers and is unable to procure nickel ore, according to people familiar with the situation.

Read more

Doug Ford wants to ‘protect Ontario’ by digging up the Ring of Fire – by Jon Thompson (Ricochet Media – February 2025)

Front

But consultation isn’t a nice-to-have, it’s international law. And local First Nations want an equitable role in the process

In response to a serious question about municipal revenues during the Northern Leaders Debate last Friday, Progressive Conservative leader Doug Ford touted the value of, “unleashing northern Ontario’s economic potential, and I’ll tell you where the potential is: their potential in the north is called the Ring of Fire.”

Ford had planned a northern victory lap to meet with industrial unions in Sault Ste. Marie and Thunder Bay this week, following leaders debates on Friday and Monday. That trip was cancelled after a plane crashed in Toronto, but it was designed to cement Ford’s vision that developing the so-called “Ring of Fire” is somehow a patriotic duty of blue-collar workers.

Read more

Column: A tungsten-tipped answer to the West’s critical metals dilemma – by Andy Home (Reuters – February 19, 2025)

https://www.reuters.com/

The critical minerals war is escalating. China’s response to US President Donald Trump’s 10% tariff hike on Chinese imports includes restricting exports of another five esoteric components of the periodic table.

Exports of bismuth, indium, molybdenum, tellurium and tungsten will only be allowed subject to Ministry of Commerce approval they will not be used in military applications. That’s a big problem for tungsten in particular. In a world where just about every metal is critical for someone, the word may be losing its meaning, as my colleague Clyde Russell has argued.

Read more

Congo Is Bleeding. Where Is the Outrage? – by Denis Mukwege (New York Times – February 19, 2025)

https://www.nytimes.com/

The world is witnessing a new era of conflict. In Gaza, images of devastation have dominated headlines for more than a year. In Ukraine, nations have rallied to defend sovereignty against aggression, deploying diplomatic interventions, sending military aid and enacting sweeping sanctions with urgency. Yet the war unfolding in the Democratic Republic of Congo remains an afterthought. A bloody conflict is met with condemnations but no meaningful action. This stark contrast is not just neglect; it is selective justice.

Last month Goma, the largest city in the east of Congo, fell to the M23 rebel group, backed by neighboring Rwanda, as part of the group’s decade-long campaign to control the region’s mineral-rich territory. The assault on Goma resulted in nearly 3,000 deaths in the first week alone and thousands of injuries.

Read more

The Story of Idar-Oberstein (Gemporia.com – September 12, 2019)

https://www.gemporia.com/en-gb/

Idar-Oberstein is a German town located in the west of the country just 45 miles from the border with Luxembourg, and 80 miles west of Frankfurt. As the crow flies, it is just under 450 miles away from our TV studios in the Midlands.

You might not have heard of it before, but it’s an incredibly important place for the gemstone cutting industry, and it has been held in high regard for hundreds of years. Here, we delve into the history and significance of the town and learn how a small area of Germany came to have such a significant impact on the gemstone world.

Read more

Buried treasure: Ontario’s new regulation aims to facilitate the recovery of minerals from mine waste, but many hurdles remain, experts say – by Kelsey Rolfe (CIM Magazine – February 20, 2025)

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

Ontario is becoming the first jurisdiction in Canada to have a dedicated regulatory pathway for projects aimed at recovering residual metals and minerals from mine waste. Experts said the move is a promising step, but technical and economic hurdles still stand in the way of wide-scale waste re-mining efforts.

The province announced a regulatory change to the Mining Act in late November 2024 to create a permit process specifically for recovering metals and minerals from tailings and mine waste at open, closed or abandoned mine sites in the province.

Read more

New book chronicles woman at centre of notorious Timmins mining scandal – by Nicole Stoffman (Timmins Daily Press – February 18, 2025)

https://www.timminspress.com/

‘I see her as the flawed hero,’ author Tim Falconer says of Viola MacMillan

A new book about a Timmins mining stock scandal launched Tuesday, Feb. 18. “Windfall, Viola MacMillan and her notorious mining scandal,” by Tim Falconer (ECW Press, 2025), tells the story of the trailblazing woman prospector and mine developer who, in July 1964, stayed quiet for three weeks while shares in her company, Windfall Oil and Mines, took off amid rumours about what the company had found on its claims near Timmins.

The claims were tantalizingly close to what would become the Kidd Creek Mine, one of the world’s largest base metal mines. When she admitted she had nothing, the stock crashed and many small investors lost money. “She out-and-out-lied to us,” investor Murray Pezim said.

Read more

‘Serious lack of details’ in [Canada Nickel] nickel mine proposal concerns group – by Andrew Autio (Timmins Daily Press – February 17, 2025)

https://www.timminspress.com/

Carbon capture process ‘encourages dangerous emissions,’ says Ontario Rivers Alliance

The Ontario Rivers Alliance has submitted its concerns regarding Canada Nickel Company’s Crawford Project to the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada (IAAC).

The proposed Crawford Project, located 43 kilometres north of Timmins, would see an open-pit nickel cobalt mine, as well as an on-site processing mill. The mine would be capable of producing up to 275,000 tonnes of ore per day, and the project is expected to last approximately 43 years.

Read more

Elon Musk casts doubt on $425 billion U.S. gold reserve at Fort Knox ahead of personal DOGE audit – by Ernest Hoffman (kitco News – February 18, 2025)

https://www.kitco.com/

(Kitco News) – Fresh off his recent forays into the Treasury Department’s payment systems, tech billionaire Elon Musk is now gearing up to conduct an in-person audit of the United States’ gold reserves at Fort Knox on behalf of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Musk announced his intentions on Monday afternoon through a pair of posts on his X platform, implying that he doubts whether the $425 billion in bullion is really there. Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, the state where Fort Knox is located, said in an interview with Fox News on Monday that he invited Musk to review the gold reserve after failing to gain access to the facility for a decade.

Read more

GRAPH: The critical minerals to watch in the US – by Frik Els (Mining.com – February 17, 2025)

https://www.mining.com/

Statements that Trump’s plans to make Canada the 51st state is all about metals and minerals, a deal for Ukraine’s rare earths (now rejected) being included in peace talks, and the current US administration reiterating its desire to buy Greenland, have thrust critical minerals into the public view like never before.

Amid all this talk it’s easy to forget that anything to do with metals and minerals – whether deemed critical or not – is really about one country. China.

Read more

Miners not ‘losing sleep’ over Trump’s tariff threat, but hope it can resolve permit delays – by Naimul Karim (Financial Post – Febuary 18, 2025)

https://financialpost.com/

Ottawa needs to remind Trump that Canada’s critical minerals are more accessible to the U.S., miners say

Some Canadian miners say they won’t be “losing sleep” over the possibility of tariffs being levied by the United States on critical minerals due to the immense demand for them from Europe and other regions, but they do want Ottawa to use these “tense times” to quickly resolve the sector’s permitting troubles.

It takes about 10 to 15 years to build a mine in Canada today, given the time it takes to explore deposits, get the required permits, look for investments, build infrastructure in rural areas and figure out a profitable way to extract the minerals.

Read more