Republic of Mining

Gold RRS 2022 – Newmont dominates gold reserves replacement – by Robert Anders (SP Global – August 10, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.spglobal.com/

Colorado-based Newmont Corp. reclaimed the title of world’s largest gold producer in 2018 as rival and partner Barrick Gold Corp.’s output fell by over 800,000 ounces. Following Newmont’s $10.01 billion acquisition of Goldcorp Inc. in 2019, its lead over Barrick grew to more than 1.5 million ounces in 2021, despite Barrick’s acquisition of Randgold Resources in January 2019.

Our analysis of Newmont’s strategies is based on a detailed compilation of its activities over the 2012-21 period, part of the Strategies for Gold Reserves Replacement study, which includes analysis of the world’s top five gold producers in 2021.

NEWS RELEASE: MATAWA CHIEFS’ COUNCIL CALL FOR ANISHINABEK GRAND CHIEF REG NIBANOBE TO RETRACT COMMENTS ENDORSING THE ACCELERATION OF ONTARIO’S ACCESS TO DEVELOPMENT OF THE NORTH (Matawa First Nations – August 11, 2022)

August 11, 2022August 11, 2022

http://www.matawa.on.ca/

[Thunder Bay, ON] In response to a CBC article published on August 10, 2022 titled ‘Ring of Fire development possible with proper First Nations consultation, says grand council chief,’ that included comments by the Anishinabek Nation Grand Chief Reg Niganobe on the future development of the Ring of Fire located in the Matawa member First Nations homelands and traditional territory–the Matawa Chiefs Council issued the following statement:

“It is highly unusual and improper for a Grand Chief to make comments related to the land, rights, interests and issues of other First Nations that are not within their own territory. Overreaching into the affairs of northern and remote First Nations, beyond their own treaty boundaries is highly inappropriate and irregular.

In Sorowako – by Adam Bobbette (London Review of Books – August 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.lrb.co.uk/

Sorowako, on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, is the site of one of the largest nickel mines on earth. Nickel is an invisible part of many everyday objects: it disappears into stainless steel, the heating elements of domestic appliances and the electrodes of rechargeable batteries.

It was formed here more than two million years ago, when the hills that surround Sorowako began to emerge along an active fault. Laterites – iron oxide and nickel-rich soils – developed through the relentless erosion of tropical rain. When I rode my scooter into the hills, the ground duly changed colour, becoming red with blood-orange streaks.

OPINION: U.S. climate bill’s EV incentives are not the game-changer North American auto industry was hoping for – by Konrad Yakabuski (Globe and Mail – August 9, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

The good news for Canada’s auto industry is that Canadian-built electric vehicles might some day be eligible for a US$7,500 tax credit under the breakthrough climate bill that U.S. President Joe Biden is expected to sign into law later this week, which scraps the Buy American provisions of an earlier legislative proposal that failed to win congressional approval.

The bad news is that, for now, the sourcing requirements in the Inflation Reduction Act, which passed the U.S. Senate on Sunday thanks to a tiebreaking vote by Vice-President Kamala Harris and is slated for a vote in the House of Representatives on Friday, are so restrictive that few EVs currently on the market, or expected to be produced in the next few years, could possibly meet them.

Tesla needs nickel to dominate the car industry. It just signed a $5 billion deal with the metal’s largest source – by Nicholas Gordon (Fortune Magazine – August 11, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://fortune.com/

If Elon Musk wants to sell 20 million cars a year by 2030, he’ll need a lot of nickel—a key metal used in the electric batteries that power Tesla cars. And now, after years of wooing, the largest source of the metal seems to have won the Tesla CEO over.

On Monday, an Indonesian cabinet minister told CNBC Indonesia that Tesla had agreed to buy $5 billion worth of nickel products from the Southeast Asian country over the next five years. Indonesia is the world’s biggest source of nickel, with about 23.7% of the world’s reserves, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. (The U.S. imports most of its nickel—which is also used to make alloys like stainless steel—from Canada, Norway, Finland, and Australia).

When Coal First Arrived, Americans Said ‘No Thanks’ – by Clive Thompson (Smithsonian Magazine – July/August 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/

Steven Preister’s house in Washington, D.C. is a piece of American history, a gorgeous 110-year-old colonial with wooden columns and a front porch, perfect for relaxing in the summer.

But Preister, who has owned it for almost four decades, is deeply concerned about the environment, so in 2014 he added something very modern: solar panels. First, he mounted panels on the back of the house, and they worked nicely. Then he decided to add more on the front, facing the street, and applied to the city for a permit.

Mining company says Nova Scotia approved bid to raise tailings dam at Gold mine (Canadian Press/Atlantic CTV News – August 11, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://atlantic.ctvnews.ca/

HALIFAX – Nova Scotia’s Environment Department has approved an application from the owners of the Touquoy gold mine to raise the height of the wall of its existing tailings waste pond.

Australian-based St Barbara’s proposal to raise the tailings wall has been opposed by environmental groups, such as the Ecology Action Centre, which have voiced concerns about the potential for a dam breach.

Glencore Takes Heat in Quebec for Smelter That Spits Out Arsenic – by Mathieu Dion (Bloomberg News – August 10, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Quebec’s public health director took aim at Glencore Plc for toxic emissions at a copper smelter in the province’s northwest, saying the level of pollution must be brought down quickly because of evidence it’s causing increased risk of cancer and other health problems.

The Horne Smelter in Rouyn-Noranda, a remote city about 600 kilometers (373 miles) northwest of Montreal, is emitting 165 nanograms of arsenic per cubic meter of air on site, according to a recent study by public health authorities in the Canadian province. That’s 55 times the standard safe level of 3 nanograms.

Talon Metals to explore 400,000 acres of Upper Peninsula for nickel deposits – by Riley Beggin (The Detroit News – August 10, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.detroitnews.com/

A metal mining company has acquired rights to explore around 400,000 acres of Upper Peninsula land for nickel deposits near the nation’s only nickel mine.

Talon Metals Corp. announced the land acquisition Wednesday from UPX Minerals Inc., which has owned it since 2013, when it was sold by Rio Tinto Group. Before that, it was owned by Ford Motor Co., whose founder Henry Ford first bought it for lumber and iron ore to build early Model Ts.

Talon aims to use the area once again to fuel American autos — this time with a crucial mineral for electric vehicle batteries.

Toxic mine pollution has turned Ohio rivers orange. Now it’s being made into paint. – by Chelsea Lee (CNN.com – August 2, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.cnn.com/

(CNN)With rolling hills, forests and hiking trails, Southeast Ohio is a haven for lovers of the outdoors. Yet cutting through the landscape are countless orange-stained streams, colored by the iron oxide pollution that has seeped into them from abandoned coal mines.

These streams are contaminated with a toxic sludge known as acid mine drainage (AMD) — the overflow of highly acidic wastewater from underground mines, created when water comes into contact with exposed mining rocks.

Column: Australia’s renewable energy ambitions dwarfed by coal, LNG juggernaut – by Clyde Russell (Reuters – August 11, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.reuters.com/

LAUNCESTON, Australia, Aug 11 (Reuters) – One of the refrains of the environmental lobby is that Australia is extremely well-placed to become a renewable energy superpower, and that this will replace the loss of revenue from coal and natural gas exports.

The problem is that only one of the two above assertions is accurate, namely that Australia is in pole position when it comes to many of the minerals that will be critical to the energy transition. These include lithium, where Australia is already the world’s top producer, as well as copper, nickel, zinc and other metals.

How This Abandoned Mining Town in Greenland Helped Win World War II – by Katie Lockhart (Smithsonian Magazine – December 27, 2019)

August 11, 2022

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/

It was a foggy morning in south Greenland as I stood on deck and peered at the mountains poking through the clouds. Our Adventure Canada expedition ship docked offshore, and we disembarked on Zodiac boats to what looked like a ghost town.

Scattered on the rocky shore were little white chunks of cryolite, a mineral once used in the production of aluminum. As the mist swept through the empty houses dotting the shorelines, we walked up to the mine—a pit spanning 755 feet long and 656 feet wide—and looked over at a glassy, water-filled bottom. Meandering through the abandoned mining town, relics of the past—old engines and bottles—mixed with fresh tire tracks and cigarette butts left by musk ox hunters passing through the area.

OPINION:Why Biden’s historic climate bill could be a big win for Canada – by Jeffrey Jones (Globe and Mail – August 8, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Washington has handed Canada’s electric vehicle and cleantech industries a big gift, in the form of a historic climate bill that creates new incentives for American consumers to buy battery-powered cars. Now it’s just a matter of not squandering it.

This weekend, the U.S. Senate voted in favour of the Inflation Reduction Act’s US$369-billion in climate and energy spending, which supporters heralded as Washington’s largest-ever climate-change-fighting initiative.

‘The Sacrifice Zone’: Myanmar bears cost of green energy – by Dake Kang, Victoria Milko and Lori Hinnant (Associated Press/Hawaii Tribune-Herald – August 10, 2022)

August 11, 2022

https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/

The birds no longer sing. The fish no longer swim in rivers that have turned a murky brown. The animals do not roam, and the cows are sometimes found dead. The people in this northern Myanmar forest have lost a way of life that goes back generations. But if they complain, they, too, face the threat of death.

This forest is the source of several key metallic elements known as rare earths, often called the vitamins of the modern world. Rare earths now reach into the lives of almost everyone on the planet, turning up in everything from hard drives and cellphones to elevators and trains.

More funding announced for Sudbury-based mining software project – by Staff (Sudbury.com – August 9, 2022)

August 10, 2022

https://www.sudbury.com/

Additional financial support has been given by the government of Ontario through the Ontario Centre of Innovation

More funding has been announced to help the Sudbury-based MIRARCO mining innovation centre further the research and development of decision-support software for underground mining applications. This is part of a three-year agreement between MIRARCO and the Australia-based RPMGlobal software company that was first highlighted last December.

In a news release issued Monday, MIRARCO said the additional financial support was given by the government of Ontario through the Ontario Centre of Innovation (OCI), an organization that supports innovators to commercialize new Ontario based technologies. A dollar amount was not revealed in the announcement.