Crees “determined to protect our way of life against the unique and grave threat posed by uranium mining and waste, today and for thousands of years to come”.

Posted: 2012-08-09

Waskaganish, Eeyou Istchee, (August 9, 2012) —The James Bay Cree Nation has declared a Permanent Moratorium on uranium exploration, uranium mining and uranium waste emplacement in Eeyou Istchee, the James Bay Cree territory. The permanent moratorium was enacted unanimously by the Annual Cree Nation General Assembly in Waskaganish.
 
“The risks inherent in uranium exploration, mining, milling, refining and transport, and in radioactive and toxic uranium mining waste, are incompatible with our stewardship responsibilities in Eeyou Istchee,” the Resolution declares.

“The Cree Nation is determined to protect our economies and way of life against the unique and grave threat posed by uranium mining and uranium waste, today and for thousands of years to come,” said Grand Chief Dr. Matthew Coon Come. “We are not opposed to sustainable and equitable mining and other industrial and resource development activities in Eeyou Istchee – but the toxic and radiation risks created by uranium mining and uranium waste are unique in scale and duration.” Read the rest of this entry »

http://www.cbc.ca/montreal/

Quebec’s party leaders tossed around the delicate subject of the province’s still operating asbestos industry on Saturday as they outlined platforms on health and the environment. François Legault, the Coalition Avenir Québec leader, said he would ban exports of asbestos from Quebec, one of a series of environmental initiatives the party laid out.
 
“Exporting a toxic product is morally and scientifically indefensible,” Legault said. “Quebec has to come to terms with an industry that’s stuck in the past.”
 
Legault said a CAQ government would honour the province’s $58-million loan to the Jeffrey asbestos mine in the Eastern Townships, which is set to reopen after it shut down last year in financial distress. But he would work with the company — the last remaining producer of asbestos in Canada — to switch to other lines of business.
 
As recently as 2010, Canada was producing 150,000 tonnes of asbestos annually, all of it in Quebec, and exporting 90 per cent — worth about $90 million — to developing countries. More than 50 countries ban the mining and use of asbestos, but Canada, traditionally a major exporter, has successfully lobbied in the past to keep it off a UN list of hazardous substances. Read the rest of this entry »

http://www.torontosun.com/home

MONTREAL – Weeks after the Liberals re-launched Quebec’s asbestos industry with a $58-million loan to the Jeffrey Mine, the Coalition Avenir Quebec vowed to put an end to the “morally and scientifically indefensible” product.

Parti Quebecois Leader Pauline Marois also criticized the Liberal Party on Saturday for its decision to loan investors tens of millions to re-open the mine in Asbestos, Que., about 160 km east of Montreal. “We were very shocked by Mr. Charest’s decision to announce an investment without holding a debate,” she told reporters on the campaign trail Saturday.

She said the PQ would hold a “societal debate” in Quebec’s legislature on the fate of the province’s asbestos industry. CAQ Leader Francois Legault said that no debate was necessary. Legault told reporters on Saturday that if elected, the CAQ wouldn’t cancel the $58-million loan, but would phase out the exportation of asbestos altogether.

“(Asbestos) does not conform to the values of Quebecers,” Legault said. “We have to turn the page.” The Liberal Party announced at the end of June that it was going to help finance the re-opening of the Jeffrey Mine. Read the rest of this entry »

www.mineweekly.com

TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – While the world worries about the eurozone debt crisis, China’s economic model and US stagnation, mining operators and developers in the Labrador Trough, an iron-ore belt that extends through Canada’s northern Quebec and Labrador, are confident of weathering the storm and continuing to expand.
 
“Production could grow by a yearly compounded growth rate of 35% over the next five years,” the mines branch of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Department for Natural Resources said in its most recent edition of ‘Minfo’.
 
The bullish outlook is predicated on China’s desire to extend seaborne trade in iron-ore away from Rio Tinto, Vale and BHP Billiton. More significantly, the nature of the ore itself makes it an attractive drawcard to steelmakers, owing to its holding less contaminants when compared with material from Australia or Brazil.
 
“Labrador Trough ore remains attractive because it is one of the cleanest in the world; it holds less contaminants such as alumina and phosphates,” Alderon Iron Ore’s VP for business development, Simon Marcotte, explained. Read the rest of this entry »

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

For Ontario Mining Association member Rubicon Minerals Corporation, like the reference of its name to Roman history, there is no turning back as it advances its Phoenix Gold Project in Red Lake towards adding to the 26 million ounces produced in this historic gold area.  Rubicon acquired control of the property in 2002 and it has a bullion production target of the first quarter of 2014.

“This is an interesting and exciting project, which has a history,” said John McDonald, Mine Manager.  “It is not often that you can jump relatively quickly from advanced exploration, to mine development and potential production in a short time period.”

Rubicon inherited some infrastructure from what was known as the old McFinley Mine site, which never really was a gold producer.  Claims were first staked on this property in 1922 and initial underground exploration took place in 1956.  From 1982 to 1989, further exploration was carried out, a shaft was built, three underground levels were developed in the mine, a 150-ton-per-day mill and tailings compound were built and bulk sampling was done on a satellite target, which lies approximately 500 metres away from the eventual discovery. Read the rest of this entry »

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

OTTAWA — Canada is in the throes of an energy identity crisis. The Northern Gateway pipeline project is in trouble in B.C. and the Chinese are stalking Alberta’s oil patch. In the East, Quebec and Newfoundland are sniping over oil and hydro reserves, and Ontario’s dream of being a green energy leader is fading.

It’s hardly what you would expect from a country that aspires to be an energy superpower. With still untapped potential in oil, shale gas and hydro, energy can drive the Canadian economy for decades to come. A recent University of Calgary School of Public Policy study estimates the potential economic boost at nearly $10-billion a year between 2016 and 2030. Or not.

There’s been a lot of talk, but so far little evidence of a long-term plan or a strategy at work. That’s unfortunate.

Fast-tracking environmental reviews isn’t a strategy on its own. Nor is blocking the oil sands’ access to world markets, as many environmentalists want. Read the rest of this entry »

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

VAL D’OR, QUEBEC – It’s the topic on which he is most proactive, promising it will play a key role in fulfilling the main plank in his platform: creating 250,000 jobs by 2017 if he forms the next government.

The Plan Nord is more than the Quebec Liberal Leader’s priority for a fourth mandate. The ambitious, 25-year, $80-billion economic program to develop natural resources in the province’s north is designed to be his main legacy. Launched during his third term in office, the Plan Nord is supposed to be to Mr. Charest what the massive James Bay hydro-electric project was to his predecessor, Robert Bourassa, in the 1970s.

Not surprisingly, most of Mr. Charest’s daily announcements are somehow linked to the Plan Nord and job creation, such as a promise to introduce Plan Nord RRSPs and to offer more long-distance training in fields such as mining and forestry. Most of his industrial visits – he does one a day – are linked to his dream of northern riches.

Still, there is no guarantee Mr. Charest will still be in power after the Sept. 4 election. Every day of the campaign, he has to bat away questions about other issues, from student protests to allegations of widespread corruption to the threat of a third referendum on sovereignty. Read the rest of this entry »

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

 Despite an impassioned resolution put forth by the Northwestern Ontario Municipal Association, which supported the construction and operation of a ferrochrome smelter at Exton, the government of Ontario announced May 9 that Capreol would be home to the new facility.
 
It was a matter of logistics, say Bill Boor, senior vice-president of global ferroalloys at Cleveland-based Cliffs Natural Resources, and David Cartella, general manager of environmental affairs and environmental counsel at Cliffs.
 
“We went through a pretty extensive analysis of all the sites where the furnace could be located,” they explain. “There were only a handful of sites that could handle this, and Sudbury was one of them … The power solution is why Sudbury was the winner.”
 
Electric arc furnaces, which are used to melt chromite ore, reach temperatures of 2,800 C. The amount of electricity needed to run the furnaces at the Capreol smelter could power a city of 300,000, Ramsey Hart, Canada program co-ordinator at Mining Watch Canada, says. ”The operation of the mine and the transportation of the minerals also have significant carbon footprints,” he says. Read the rest of this entry »