Republic of Mining

Virus fails to dull Diggers-NOT even a global pandemic could stop Diggers & Dealers 2020 – by Kristie Batten (Mining News Net – October 20, 2020)

October 23, 2020

https://www.miningnews.net/

The 29th instalment of the famous Kalgoorlie event looked shaky even as recently as eight weeks ago, but went off without a hitch. Due to COVID-19, this year’s event was held two months later and lacked interstate and international attendees, but it really wasn’t that different to previous years.

The noticeable differences included the heat – it got to a sweltering 37 degrees on the Wednesday – and a few measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Hand sanitiser was included with the delegate bags and sanitiser stations were located around the venue. The venue – comprising the Goldfields Art Centre and two marquees – had separate entry and exit points to control the movement of people.

Canadian Mining Hall of Fame to Welcome Five New Members in 2021

October 22, 2020

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TORONTO, OCTOBER 22, 2020 – The Canadian Mining Hall of Fame (CMHF) will welcome five extraordinary individuals who have made incredible and lasting contributions to Canada’s mining industry:

• Patricia Dillon
• David Elliott
• William Gladstone Jewitt
• Steven D. Scott
• Mary Edith Tyrrell

Over the past 33 years, the CMHF has recognized 190 exemplary men and women who helped build Canada’s mining industry into the global leader, embodied the important role mining plays in Canadian society and inspired future generations in mining. While the global pandemic has altered plans for the Annual Dinner & Induction Ceremony, the CMHF remains steadfast in its vision to be the enduring source of information that shares the significant contributions of individuals who shape Canada’s global mining industry.

Gold mining industry in Ontario during Q2 2020 – by Vladimir Basov (Kitco News – October 21, 2020)

October 22, 2020

https://www.kitco.com/

Gold production in Ontario in Q2 2020 declined by 17% over Q2 2019 due to suspensions related to COVID-19 crisis. Detour Lake was the largest gold mine in Ontario.

Ontario is the largest gold-producing Canadian province or territory. According to the Ontario Mining Association, the region produced 73,733 kilograms of gold in 2019, which equates to 2,371 thousand troy ounces of gold, or 42% of total gold produced in Canada.

Based on available quarterly corporate reports, Ontario produced 528 kozt of gold in Q2 2020 from primary gold mines and as a by-product of base metals and platinum group metals operations. This significant 17% decline over the corresponding period of 2019 (638 kozt) was primarily caused by suspensions related to COVID-19 crisis.

Global nickel production to decline by 7.4 percent in 2020 – by Scott Birch (Mining Global – October 19, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://www.miningglobal.com/

Global nickel production is expected to decline by 7.4 percent to 2,195 thousand tonnes (kt) in 2020, according to a GlobalData report.

The temporary suspensions of mines and mining activities due to the COVID-19 pandemic, along with the advancement of Indonesia’s export ban, are expected to be significant contributors towards this decline, the report adds.

Indonesia’s mine production is expected to fall to 680kt in 2020 – down by 15 percent compared to the 800kt registered in 2019. This is due to the advancement of the exports ban from 2022 to 2020, it says.

We Need a Nuclear New Deal, Not a Green New Deal – by Emmet Penney and Adrian Calderon (The Bellows – September 25, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://www.thebellows.org/

In July, presidential candidate Joe Biden released his climate and infrastructure plan, “The Biden Plan to Build a Modern, Sustainable Infrastructure and an Equitable Clean Energy Future.”

From the automotive industry, to infrastructure, to addressing racial inequality, to labor protections, to a massive renewable energy build out, Biden aims to remake the American industrial base, right past wrongs, and generate a gobsmacking 10 million “good union jobs” in the process.

For comparison, the Works Progress Administration under the New Deal created 8.5 million jobs. Biden’s capacious plan has raised eyebrows. Some believe it speaks to his “deceptive radicalism;” others rightly point out that he’s “endorsed the Green New Deal in all but name.”

Rio Tinto-owned company in dispute with Federal Government over Kakadu uranium mine – by Cathy Van Extel and Scott Mitchell (Australian Broadcasting Corporation – October 20, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://www.abc.net.au/

The Ranger Uranium Mine in Kakadu is looming as the next great test of mining giant Rio Tinto, following the international outcry over the destruction of the 46,000-year-old Juukan caves in the Pilbara.

A subsidiary of Rio Tinto is in dispute with the Federal Government over paying for scientiﬁc monitoring of the mine, which is on the edge of world heritage wetlands and will close in January 2021.

Under an agreement with the Federal Government, the site must be rehabilitated by 2026.

Tesla’s move into mining aimed at energising battery supply chain – by Henry Sanderson (Financial Times – October 20, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://www.ft.com/

When Tesla held its socially distanced “battery day” last month at an outdoor parking lot in California, it invited executives from the two big US lithium companies, Livent and Albemarle.

As they sat in their allotted Model 3s watching Elon Musk on their in-car screens, he dropped a bombshell: the electric car maker was becoming a competitor.

Tesla, Mr Musk said, had acquired the rights to a 10,000-acre plot in Nevada where it planned to extract the metal using simple table salt, and would build a lithium refinery to supply a new factory in Texas. The next day Albemarle and Livent lost a combined $1.7bn in market value as their share prices plunged.

Ottawa’s climate-change policies fail to protect First Nations against food scarcity: study – by Kathryn Blaze Baum (Globe and Mail – October 21, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Federal climate-change policies have largely ignored the effects of global warming on First Nations’ access to traditional food, leaving Indigenous people increasingly vulnerable to food shortages and related health problems, according to an 18-month study by an international human rights agency.

The Human Rights Watch report details the myriad challenges First Nations people are confronting with greater frequency when trying to acquire healthy food – from thin ice cover on traditional hunting routes to biodiversity loss, unpredictable winter roads, shorter hunting seasons and lower yields of fish in waters that not long ago boasted bountiful stocks.

First Nations people who live off the land are bearing the brunt of the effects of climate change on food security, the report says.

Nevada Energy to buy BC nickel project, stock up – by Staff (Mining.com – October 20, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://www.mining.com/

Nevada Energy Metals (TSXV: BFF) has entered into an option agreement on the Klone Group of mineral claims (1,400 ha) adjoining the Decar property owned by FPX Nickel (TSXV: FPX) located 100 km northwest of Fort St. James, British Columbia, in the Omineca mining division.

The optionor is Ursula Mowat, a professional geoscientist who has owned the property since 1987.

She is a recipient of the H.H “Spud” Huestis Award (2015), along with Peter Bradshaw and Ron Britten of FPX Nickel, for “excellence in prospecting and mineral exploration” in recognition of their efforts in identifying and commencing development of a new type of nickel deposit exemplified by the Decar project.

Pandemic provides impetus for gov’t to kill resource development in Canada – by David Duval (Resource World – October19, 2020)

October 21, 2020

https://resourceworld.com/

Throughout the history of advanced Western democracies there’s probably never been a year quite like 2020. Most of the wars Canada and its allies have fought were overseas (Europe and Asia), with virtually no danger to their citizens residing on home soil. Governments were not able to impose restrictions on its citizens like they are today in their efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

In Canada, the ruling Liberal government – aided by the New Democratic Party – is using the pandemic to implement a radical ideologically-driven agenda that would have been impossible had Canadians not felt threatened by a virus.

Among the most serious threats to our long-term economic security is the massive deficit that Canada is presently running – estimated to be at least $350 billion this fiscal year. (It’s hard to tell what the final number will be given the fact the government has not formally tabled a budget to parliament).

The 4 environmental issues in northwest B.C. every voter should know about – by Matt Simmons (The Narwhal – October 20, 2020)

October 21, 2020

The Narwhal

As Coastal GasLink workers prepared for test drilling under the Wedzin Kwa river in northwest B.C. while salmon were spawning last week, Wet’suwet’en land defenders gathered in the area to show their opposition to the controversial pipeline that is planned to transport fracked gas across the province to be shipped to Asia.

The workers read the land defenders the B.C. Supreme Court injunction that prohibits them from stopping work along the pipeline right of way. In response, the land defenders re-served the workers with an eviction notice from the Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs. The RCMP were called to the site, but no arrests were made.

At a rally in Smithers in support of the land defenders, Gidimt’en Clan spokesperson Jennifer Wickham fought back tears as she said the whole province should know and care about the Coastal GasLink pipeline, which threatens the health of plants, animals and humans.

The Price of Gold – Lessons From Previous Price Cycles – Canadian Business History Association Webinar With Tony Fell, Stan Sudol and Mike Parkins (Albany Club Toronto – September 17, 2020)

October 20, 2020

Gold has been an alluring commodity for centuries as both an investment, an industrial input, and a consumer product. With the price of gold hitting all-time highs, what can past price cycles reveal about today and the future? This timely CBHA/ACHA webinar investigates this question from the point of view of three experts. Mr. …

More gold ‘yet to be discovered’ at Kirkland Lake’s Macassa Mine – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – October 20, 2020)

October 20, 2020

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Exploration drilling at Macassa Mine continue to produce spectacular grades for Kirkland Lake Gold.

The Toronto-headquartered mining company released drill results from its exploration program in Kirkland Lake where the focus is on growing gold reserves at its South Mine Complex and finding more high-grade gold further out and deeper down along the unexplored zones around the Amalgamated Break.

In an Oct. 19 news release, the company said it’s seeing “extremely high-grade intersections” from its program to extend the South Mine Complex to the east and west, in identifying high-grade mineralization along the Amalgamated Break, and in identifying a new, high-grade corridor along Main Break near the location of its new No. 4 shaft.

The Socialist Win in Bolivia and the New Era of Lithium Extraction – by Kate Aronoff (The New Republic – October 2020)

October 20, 2020

https://newrepublic.com/

An apparent victory for Evo Morales’s Movement Toward Socialism shows that tomorrow’s green energy won’t look much like the old oil empires

Just under a year after Evo Morales’s government was ousted by U.S.-backed far-right forces, his Movement Toward Socialism, or MAS, party looks almost certain to take back power after Sunday’s election.

Morales, the country’s first Indigenous president, remains in exile in Argentina. His election in 2019 remains hotly debated: While the Electoral Observation Mission of the Organization of American States challenged the result due to a gap between preliminary and final results, subsequent analyses have argued that the gap was explainable and legitimate and that the OAS assessment was “flawed” and highly political.

Now, with an estimated 52.4 percent of the vote, Morales’s former finance minister, Luis Arce, is on track to become the country’s new leader after a deadly year of racist state repression under interim President Jeanine Añez Chávez.

State holding to be Indonesia’s battering ram into global battery market – by Norman Harsono (Jakarta Post Jakarta – October 16, 2020)

October 20, 2020

https://www.thejakartapost.com/

Indonesia has mobilized three of its biggest state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and opened talks with two foreign multinationals to bring Southeast Asia’s largest economy into the world’s highly lucrative electric vehicle (EV) battery market.

The SOEs Ministry has ordered mining holding MIND ID, oil and gas giant Pertamina and electricity monopoly PLN to establish a holding company – tentatively “PT Indonesia Battery Holding” – that will develop an end-to-end domestic supply chain for EV batteries.

The trio are also in talks with China’s CATL and South Korea’s LG Chem, the world’s top two EV battery makers by output, to invest between US$12 billion and $20 billion in developing the dream supply chain.