Developers struggle to balance exploration with native consultations – by Shawn McCarthy (Globe and Mail – January 28, 2013)

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 — As the first aboriginal president of the Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada, Glenn Nolan has a unique understanding of the resource sector’s increasingly onerous duty to consult with First Nations when developing mining or energy projects.

Mr. Nolan is vice-president of NorOnt Resources Ltd., one of the leading companies developing the mineral deposits in northern Ontario’s Ring of Fire district. He knows how critical it is, in a hyper-competitive industry, for mining companies to be able to move swiftly and secretively in establishing claims to promising tracts of land.

But as a former chief of the Missanabie Cree from northeastern Ontario, he is also acutely aware of the potential for resource development to help lift Canada’s First Nations out of crushing poverty, and the need for a respectful partnership between industry, government and the indigenous people.

“We’ve been saying all along to our [Prospectors & Developers Association] members that the best strategy is to go in at the earliest opportunity and talk to the community,” Mr. Nolan said. “And that means as soon as you’ve secured the land tenure.”

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Junior miner sizes up carbon trading market – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – January 25, 2013)

Established in 1980, Northern Ontario Business provides Canadians and international investors with relevant, current and insightful editorial content and business news information about Ontario’s vibrant and resource-rich North. Ian Ross is the editor of Northern Ontario Business ianross@nob.on.ca.

A Toronto mineral exploration outfit is dipping its toe in the carbon credit pool. Noble Mineral Exploration has hooked up with Mikro-Tek, a Timmins-based forest biotech company, to evaluate the carbon credit potential of the trees on its exploration property northeast of the city.

Mikro-Tek and IBK Capital have produced some preliminary numbers on the carbon sequestration values of Noble’s massive 60,700-hectare gold and nickel play, known as Project 81.

A baseline estimate indicates that the forest on Noble’s property has a present-day net credit value of $100 million based on a price of $15 per tonne of carbon dioxide (CO 2).

For Noble president H. Vance White, that’s a better alternative than raising capital by cutting down trees to turn into two-by-fours.“This timber asset will generate far more in revenues, based even on a $10 per tonne basis, than it would ever do by harvesting the timber,” said White.

The Project 81 property was heavily logged by a succession of forestry companies, ending with Abitibi-Bowater. A report shows the spruce, balsam and poplar on the property can absorb about 3.1 million tonnes of carbon dioxide.

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Wynne for the North? – by Star Staff (Sudbury Star – January 28, 2013)

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

Rick Bartolucci, Sudbury’s Liberal MPP, said Kathleen Wynne has “very strong interpersonal skills” and the two enjoyed a good relationship in the cabinet of outgoing premier Dalton McGuinty.

Bartolucci supported another cabinet minster, Sandra Pupatello, in the leadership campaign to replace McGuinty. Asked whether his support of Pupetello would cause a problem for him now that Wynne is party leader, Bartolucci said no.

“We’re a Liberal family,” he said. “We’re an incredibly united family. I look forward to serving” in whatever capacity Wynne may ask.

Bar tolucci, who has been Sudbury MPP since 1995, has been a cabinet minister since 2003, serving in a number of portfolios, but mostly as minister of Northern Development and Mines. During the leadership campaign, Wynne said she would create a northern cabinet committee and put more emphasis on northern infrastructure — such as roads and bridges — and transportation.

She also said she would be committed to completing the widening of Highway 69, from Sudbury to Parry Sound, to four lanes, and making sure the so-called Ring of Fire, a mineral-rich area in the Far North, is developed. One of the companies active in the Ring of Fire, Cliffs Natural Resources, wants to open a smelter in Capreol to process chromite mined in the Ring of Fire.

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Wynne needs seasoned Northerners – by Carl Clutchey (Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal – January 28, 2013)

The Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal is the daily newspaper of Northwestern Ontario.

Will Northern Liberal MPPs who backed the runner-up candidate in Saturday’s leadership convention pay a heavy price? Not necessarily, says one veteran political observer and former MPP.

Thunder Bay Coun. Iain Angus said Sunday that Natural Resources Minister Michael Gravelle of Thunder Bay and Northern Development and Mines Minister Rick Bartolucci of Sudbury may very well retain cabinet posts under new party leader and soon-to-be premier Kathleen Wynne.

“First off, (Wynne) is going to need some representation from Northern Ontario, and she’s also going to need some people with experience,” said Angus, who was an NDP MPP for two years in the mid-1970s. Gravelle and Bartolucci fit the bill on both counts, said Angus. “The question is, what ministry will they end up with?

“The thing about a cabinet shuffle is that it can take a very long time (for new ministers) to get up to speed,” he said.
Gravelle and Bartolucci, along with MPP Bill Mauro (Thunder Bay-Atikokan) and Sault Ste. Marie MPP David Orazietti all backed runner-up Sandra Pupatello, the former Windsor MPP who was seen to have the backing of the Liberal party establishment.

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New Brunswick pushes cross-country pipeline as ‘game changer’ – by Jane Taber, Shawn McCarthy and Nathan Vanderklippe (Globe and Mail – January 28, 2013)

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.

HALIFAX, OTTAWA and CALGARY — New Brunswick Premier David Alward is headed to Alberta to inject some political momentum into a proposed $5-billion, cross-Canada oil pipeline that he describes as a nation-building project.

The Progressive Conservative Premier will make his first visit to Alberta early next month, where he will meet with his counterpart, Alison Redford, travel to Fort McMurray to tour the oil sands, and visit industry executives in Calgary.

In an interview, Mr. Alward expressed enthusiasm for the proposed TransCanada pipeline project that would bring western oil to eastern Canadian refineries, and perhaps allow for crude exports from the deep-water port of Saint John.

“This is something that is potentially a game-changer for New Brunswick, but more importantly than just New Brunswick, for all of Canada,” Mr. Alward said.

Ms. Redford echoed that enthusiasm in an interview, characterizing the west-east pipeline as “critically important.” She added, too, that she believes the project is “quite feasible” and “economically viable” for the industry.

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TIMMINS HISTORY: Mine mishap caused a stir – by Karen Bachmann (Timmins Daily Press – January 27, 2013)

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – Every community, from Paris to Timbuktu, from Toronto to Earlton, has its fair share of, for lack of a better word, “colourful characters” and eccentrics.

Kirkland Lake had Roza Brown (a woman way before her time who sure knew how to live). Elk Lake claims John Munroe (war hero, mining man, mayor and surely someone who could have been the first candidate for his own reality programme).

We here in the Porcupine seem to have an unending supply: Tommy Jack, Maggie Leclair, Sandy McIntyre, and, although not purely from the Porcupine, a celebrated priest known as Father Charles Paradis.

Notorious, revolutionary and with a blazing zeal to see the Northland colonized, Paradis has left his mark from Temiskaming up to the Porcupine. Recognized or not, we still live with his influence and his controversial views on land and river management.

Charles Paradis was born in Kamouraska, Que., in 1848. He completed his studies at the seminary in Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pocatière and headed to Ottawa where he taught art.

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Ontario Liberal leadership: Behind the scenes with Kathleen Wynne – by Jennifer Wells (Toronto Star – January 26, 2013)

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

From the vantage point of the midsection of the 14-metre megabus plastered with Kathleen Wynne’s grinning visage, the candidate’s feet, encased in over-the-knee black leather boots, can be seen dangling across the arm rest. This signals that the Liberal party leadership hopeful is in rare repose, supine across two seats as the “Win-with-Wynne” campaign bus whistle stops through London-Strathroy, or possibly Wingham-Neustadt, or could this be Peterborough-Cobourg?

The truth of the matter is Wynne doesn’t commonly “do” repose. For 2 1/2 days last weekend she unfailingly kept an upbeat So-This-is-What-the-Inside-of-a-Tim-Hortons-Looks-Like! demeanour as she greeted delegates, anti-wind-turbine activists, riding officials (and the occasional baby), racing toward what one can only hope will be the last delegated leadership convention in the province’s history.

Only once did Wynne publicly kvetch as she headed out for her essential mind-clearing half-hour run Sunday morning to find herself stuck in deep snow and an oncoming whiteout. “I couldn’t move!” she bleated, before reboarding the bubble bus.

(At the age of 18 and in high school, Wynne ran the 440 in 63.3 seconds, a record, she cheekily notes, that still stands. The conversion to metric was made the following year. Wynne still runs daily and appears to have the body fat of a whippet.)

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Ontario’s gas-plant stink will linger after Dalton McGuinty’s departure – by Andy Frame (Toronto Star – January 26, 2013)

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

Andy Frame is a consultant in the electrical power industry. Formerly he was a senior adviser on electric utilities for the Ontario energy ministry, a municipal hydro chairman and chair of the Utility Association.

This weekend, the Ontario Liberal party will have a new leader, the province will have a new premier and — eventually — the legislature will begin a new session.

But one old question remains. The opposition parties are determined to force the government to bring out all the details of the McGuinty administration’s power plant selection process, which they claim will cost the province up to $900 million.

Let’s go back five years to when the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) first announced its plan to build two new gas-fired power plants to serve the GTA. At a meeting attended by more than 500 in Mississauga, an OPA manager explained the site-selection process and listed the 10 sites under consideration. Local meetings were to be held to meet with citizen groups and other interested parties to explain the need for more power and the site-selection criteria.

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[Sudbury] Union presses for safety probe – by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – January 26, 2013)

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

The result of a Ministry of Labour investigation into the Jan. 29, 2012 death of Vale miner Stephen Perry confirms the need for an inquiry into mine safety in Ontario, says the president of the union to which Perry belonged.

Rick Bertrand, head of United Steelworkers Local 6500, repeated the call for an inquiry originally made after the investigation into the deaths of Stobie miners Jason Chenier, 35, and Jordan Fram, 26, on June 8, 2011.

The labour ministry released its summary report on Perry’s death Friday, saying it would not be laying charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act. In the Stobie deaths, 15 charges were laid by the ministry against Vale and one of its supervisors, under that same act, and they are proceeding through the court system.

Bertrand said the labour ministry’s investigation confirmed a finding of the union’s joint investigation with Vale into Perry’s death at Coleman in Levack. “Stephen Perry was killed even though he did everything right at work that day,” said Bertrand. “This tragedy re-confirms there is more we can, and must, do to prevent workplace deaths.” 

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Xstrata, Mine Mill brace for possible job action – by Star staff (Sudbury Star – January 26, 2013)

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

It’s the yin-yang of contract negotiations. As bargaining committee members for Mine Mill Local 598/CAW and Xstrata Nickel met Friday to forge a new collective agreement, preparations were going on — on both sides — should those talks fail.

Residents of Falconbridge, where Xstrata Nickel’s Sudbury operations are headquartered, received letters in the mail from the union, asking for their “support, co-operation and patience should it be necessary.” The deadline for the current three-year contract between the miner and its union is Jan. 31. Local 598 has a 96% strike mandate from members should it need it at 12:01 a.m. Feb. 1.

Since talks began in December, both sides have said they have hopes of settling a new three-year deal. But in labour negotiations, it’s customary for both sides to prepare for the worst while hoping for the best.

Anne Marie MacInnis, vice-president of Mine Mill 598/CAW, is strike co-ordinator for the local. She was awaiting delivery Friday afternoon of a 10-by 44-foot strike trailer to be placed on city property in front of Xstrata Nickel’s operations.

Schedules for picket duty were also being drafted, arrangements were being made to set up accounts to purchase food and gasoline, and other strike-related actions were being planned.

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