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‘Dangerous’: Scientists Say Gates and Bezos-Backed Mining Venture Could Threaten Arctic Ecosystem – by Noah Kirsch (The Daily Beast – August 10, 2021)

https://www.thedailybeast.com/

A phalanx of billionaires are backing a new mining initiative in Greenland, in what they hope will boost access to minerals used to manufacture electric cars. It’s significant news in a country that has not always celebrated natural resource exploration. And it has some environmental scientists concerned.

The source of the billionaire money is an initiative founded by Bill Gates, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, whose investors include Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, Jack Ma, Ray Dalio, and Michael Bloomberg.

Gates founded Breakthrough Energy in 2015 as a vehicle for combating climate change, and it has raised $2 billion to date, including a $1 billion funding round completed earlier this year. The organization has invested in dozens of startups in the sustainable energy space.

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Canada’s first rare earth miner in trading halt on expansion rumours – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – August 10, 2021)

https://www.mining.com/

Australia’s Vital Metals (ASX: VML), the first rare earths producer in Canada, has announced a trading halt until Thursday, August 12, on reports of negotiations to acquire two projects in Quebec, one of which is considered to be the world’s fourth largest dysprosium deposit.

The company, AFR reported, is said to be in final talks to acquire the Zues project and a 68% interest in Kipawa, two rare earths assets owned by Quebec Precious Metals Corp. (TSX-V: QPM).

Pushing the Aussie miner’s shares up, which have climbed 22% in the last week and an eye-popping 308% in the past year, was Vital’s announcement on Monday that it is actively seeking to expand into US capital markets.

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Will the lithium shortage put the brakes on electric-car plans? – by Neil Briscoe (The Irish Times – August 11, 2021)

https://www.irishtimes.com/

A global shortage of lithium – the metal mineral crucial for modern rechargeable battery design – may put the brakes on the development of new electric cars.

Market analysts Benchmark Mineral Intelligence (BMI) is predicting an “acute” shortage of lithium from 2022 onwards, according to Reuters. That shortage of supply could derail the stated plans of a majority of Europe’s carmakers as they seek to create all-electric line-ups by the end of the decade.

“Unless we see significant and imminent investment into large, commercially viable lithium deposits, these shortages will extend out to the end of the decade,” said George Miller of BMI. Part of the problem is that although the value of lithium has gone up in recent years, that rise hasn’t yet been enough to trigger major investments in new mining operations.

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IPCC’s ridiculous code red for humanity is a declaration of defeat – by Rex Murphy (National Post – August 11, 2021)

https://nationalpost.com/

The IPCC has gone code red for humanity. They have hit their loudest alarm bells. Wow. Grab your masks, and head for the exits. This is scary stuff. What dire happening could justify the IPCC reaching for the greatest alarm? There are only two possibilities.

Either Joe Biden has uttered a comprehensible sentence without outside assistance, or, the world is doomed. It has to be the latter because the former is unthinkable.

Before I get to this crisis I should point out that most of us sentenced to work in the news media know what those initials, IPCC, stand for. Contrary to the impression you’d get from reading the newspaper or listening to the news, most ordinary Canadians do not. Which is just one way of saying, they have lives. And allow me to whisper, they probably own pickup trucks.

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SCRAPING THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA – by Alec Dubro (Foreign Policy in Focus – August 10, 2021)

https://fpif.org/

Deep sea mining companies are not just exploiting the oceans, they’re harming the low-income nations surrounding the proposed mine sites.

On July 29, the two-day Wokisok Shark Calling Festival will begin at Kono village, New Ireland, Papua New Guinea. It’s not a new gimmick to capitalize on Shark Week or Sharknado movies—although foreign visitors are welcome. Nor do people stand on the beach and yell, Shark!

Instead it’s a seasonal rite where fishers paddle out from shore and summon sharks with noise and motion makers—and then they hope, capture them. It’s supposed to ensure shark harvests for peoples who depend in part on this source of protein. It’s actually one of many such ceremonies that take place in this area of the Pacific.

Although the Kono Village festival hadn’t been observed for years, it has been revived this year with an added fillip. It’s being held to rally the campaign to stop the relentless attempt by deep-pocketed mining investors called the Solwara 1 project to tear up the local sea bed in search of minerals.

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Manitoba must do more to encourage mining – by Joseph Quesnel (Troy Media – August 9, 2021)

https://troymedia.com/

Joseph Quesnel is a senior research associate with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.

The Manitoba mining industry received some good news recently, but the province still needs to reform its mining policies for the sector to thrive.

Despite some progress over the years, the province continues to have a hostile climate for investment: this needs to change.

Vale Ltd. recently announced a $150-million investment to extend nickel mining activities in Thompson by a decade. The company will also engage in some aggressive exploration drilling of known ore bodies to extend the life of the mine even further.

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‘We are shocked’: Miner blasts feds for blocking Grassy Mountain – by Ian Vandaelle (Bloomberg News – August 9, 2021)

https://ampvideo.bnnbloomberg.ca/

The Australian miner that’s looking to build a massive new metallurgical coal mine on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains is vowing it will not give up its fight after Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson reaffirmed a joint-panel decision that effectively struck down the proposed project.

In a statement Monday, Benga Mining Ltd. said it is reviewing Wilkinson’s Aug. 6 decision regarding the Grassy Mountain project with its legal counsel, after the feds upheld a decision from the Joint Review Panel (JRP) and the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) that determined the project would likely result in “significant adverse environmental effects” on water quality, the local trout population and vegetation.

In the release, Benga Mining Chief Executive Officer John Wallington said Wilkinson had made his determination in spite of the miner’s request he hold off action while the company pursued a legal appeal of the JRP decision, which halted development in June.

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Noront Resources’ board likes what BHP has to offer – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – August 10, 2021)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Environmental groups claim Ring of Fire mine developer is hiding something, wants OSC to investigate

Ring of Fire mine developer Noront Resources is urging its shareholders to accept BHP Group’s offer to buy its nickel, copper and chromite properties in Ontario’s Far North.

BHP, one of the world’s largest mining companies, entered the picture in late July with a cash offer of $325 million, or $0.55 cents a share, to best a hostile insider takeover offer made by its Australian rival Wyloo, Noront’s biggest shareholder at 25 per cent. Wyloo is owned by Australian mining magnate Andrew Forrest.

In a mere formality, Noront said it has filed a directors’ circular recommending its shareholders accept the BHP offer. Noront’s board of directors said it represents a 129 per cent higher premium than where Noront’s shares were trading before Wyloo made its unsolicited bid at the end of May, and is 75 per cent higher than $0.315 share offer proposed by Wyloo.

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NEWS RELEASE: The Minister of Environment and Climate Change approves the Rose Lithium-Tantalum Mining Project (August 10, 2021)

OTTAWA, ON, Aug. 10, 2021 /CNW/ – The Government of Canada conducts rigorous impact assessments based on science and Indigenous knowledge.

Following a thorough environmental assessment conducted by the Joint Assessment Committee, comprised of representatives from the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada (the Agency) and the Cree Nation Government, the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, the Honourable Jonathan Wilkinson, has agreed with the conclusions of the Committee’s Environmental Assessment Report and has decided that the proposed Rose Lithium-Tantalum Mining Project is not likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects when mitigation measures are taken into account. Therefore, the project is allowed to proceed.

Today, Minister Wilkinson issued a Decision Statement to this effect under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, 2012 (CEAA 2012). The Minister’s Decision Statement establishes 221 legally binding conditions with which the proponent must comply throughout the life of the project. These conditions include measures to protect fish and fish habitat, migratory birds and birds at risk, wetlands, woodland caribou, bats at risk and the current use of lands and resources for traditional purposes by the Crees.

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EXCLUSIVE Peru’s finance chief says mining taxes can rise without affecting competitiveness – by Marco Aquino and Marcelo Rochabrun (Reuters – August 9, 2021)

https://www.reuters.com/

LIMA, Aug 9 (Reuters) – Peru’s finance minister, Pedro Francke, told Reuters on Monday that the new leftist government can increase mining taxes to fund public spending without affecting private-sector competitiveness, all while reducing the fiscal deficit.

Peru, the world’s No. 2 copper producer, is highly dependent on mining taxes and new President Pedro Castillo has promised to deliver more social programs to lift the country’s poor.

The election of Castillo, a member of a Marxist-Leninist party, as president in June has spooked investors, with Peru’s Sol currency falling to a fresh record low against the dollar on Monday.

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Opinion: The Trudeau government can no longer ‘freeze out’ pro-development First Nations – by Heather Exner-Pirot (National Post – August 11, 2021)

https://nationalpost.com/

Heather Exner-Pirot is a research adviser to the Indigenous Resource Network and a fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

Canada has adopted one-sided consultation processes that favour First Nations that oppose resource extraction at the expense of those that support such projects. That was the finding of a judge recently in a rebuke to the federal government for its treatment of the Ermineskin Cree Nation.

Their case makes explicit what many of us have observed over the years: Indigenous people who support resource development do not fall comfortably into mainstream Canada’s idealized version of what Indigenous people should and shouldn’t do, and they are therefore ignored.

This particular claim saw the Ermineskin Cree, one of the four Nations of Maskwacis in western Alberta, contest a designation order that the federal Minister of the Environment, Jonathan Wilkinson, had placed on the Phase II expansion of Vista coal mine in July 2020.

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New mines, hundreds of jobs, loom on the horizon for Northern Ontario – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – August 9, 2021)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Open-pit construction underway in Gogama, Dubreuilville and poised to start at Geraldton

Northern Ontario has a raft of new mines currently under construction or close to turning the sod, mainly driven by steady gold prices.

Three companies, with multi-million-dollar open-pit projects on the books in Gogama, Dubreuilville and Geraldton, posted recent updates as hundreds of contractors are streaming to the sites to drill and blast and erect new infrastructure.

Halfway between Timmins and Sudbury, more than 700 contractors are building IAMGOLD’s Côté Gold open-pit mine outside the town of Gogama. Côté, located just off Highway 144, is 130 kilometres southwest of Timmins and 175 kilometres north of Sudbury.

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AUSTRALIA’S NUCLEAR DILEMMA – PROF. IAN LOWE – by Kerrod Trott (Westender – August 9, 2021)

https://westender.com.au/

Ian Lowe’s new book – Long Half-life – The Nuclear Industry in Australia – is a timely and riveting account of the political, social and scientific complexities of the nuclear industry, revealing the power of vested interests, the subjectivities of scientists and the transformative force of community passion.

In describing the book, Ian Lowe said:

The discovery of large uranium deposits in the Northern Territory suggested that Australia could become a major exporter of radioactive minerals.

The Fox Report, commissioned by the Whitlam government to study the environmental impacts of the proposed Ranger uranium mine, broadened into an inquiry into the social and political issues of producing uranium.

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Barrick Gold’s CEO is stuck: He would love to acquire, but promised investors some discipline – by Tim Kiladze (Globe and Mail – August 10, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Two and a half years into his tenure as Barrick Gold Corp.’s chief executive, Mark Bristow is sticking to the party line, reassuring investors that miners have learned from past mistakes and will not overpay for deals.

“We blew our brains out over the last big bull market,” he said in an interview Monday. After enduring billions of dollars of writedowns and adding boatloads of debt, he has a new mantra for Barrick: “We’re not putting our balance sheet at risk.”

But Mr. Bristow is a conflicted man, because in almost the same breath he acknowledges that he would love for Barrick to get bigger. After all, this is a man who, without hesitation, publicly floated merging with giants Newmont Mining and Freeport-McMoRan in the past, only to be rebuffed.

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OIL BOOM AND BUST, [POLISH]GALICIAN STYLE – by Norman Ravvin (Canadian Jewish News – October 1, 2015)

https://www.cjnews.com/

Peak Oil. Neil Young’s condemnation of the environmental damage caused by the Alberta “Tar Sands.” The Leap Manifesto on climate and energy policy. All this seems notably of our moment. But the challenges raised – the impact of petroleum discoveries on the economy, daily life and the environment – have an important mid-19th century Polish precedent.

It was in south-eastern Poland, not far from the Hungarian and Russian borders, that important discoveries associated with wax, petroleum, and distillation methods turned a semi-feudal, mostly rural landscape into one of the first oil economies of the modern era. By their great numbers and their peculiar status in 19th-century Polish society, Jews played a substantial role at all levels of this economic transformation.

The Jewish Oil Magnates of Galicia – a hybrid volume that includes a historical study by Valerie Schatzker and a translation of the 1954 Yiddish novel The Jewish Oil Magnates by Julien Hirszhaut – tells this story with verve and impressive detail.

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