Republic of Mining

BHP Billiton’s Samarco nears $7b deal on Brazil dam disaster – by John Kehoe (Australian Financial Review – January 23, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://www.afr.com/

BHP Billiton’s stricken Samarco iron ore joint venture is nearing a $7 billion settlement with the Brazilian government for environmental and community damages caused by a deadly dam disaster last year, the country’s attorney general said.

Talks had “advanced significantly” and a deal could be reached by early February, Attorney General Luis Inacio Adams told reporters after representatives from Samarco and the government met on Thursday, Reuters reported.

Under the preliminary plan still under negotiation, Samarco would be given up to 10 years to pay the 20 billion reais fine and need to address 38 requirements.

[New Caledonia] Island of Nickel Losing Money as World’s Mines Shun Output Cuts – by Jesse Riseborough and Agnieszka De Sousa (Bloomberg News – January 22, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://www.bloomberg.com/

On a remote island in the Pacific Ocean, mine owners like Glencore Plc and Vale SA are losing money on every ton of nickel they unearth in what amounts to a contest to see who can endure the agony longer.

A prolonged surplus of nickel has sent prices plunging to a 12-year low and below the cost of production for more than two thirds of the world’s mines.

Nowhere is the strain more acute than in New Caledonia, a former Napoleonic penal colony 1,000 miles from Australia’s eastern coast that drew billions of dollars in investment when the metal reached a record before the financial crisis. Now, an island with 15 percent of the planet’s reserves has become a cautionary tale for an industry unwilling to curtail supply.

Aluminum stockpiling fund gives glimpse of China metals reforms – by Polly Yam and David Stanway (Reuters U.S. – January 21, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://www.reuters.com/

HONG KONG/BEIJING – China’s plans to set up funds to manage coal and steel capacity closures and stockpiling schemes offer nervous markets some clarity on the likely future make-up of the country’s sprawling and predominantly state-run metals and mining industries.

As the world’s largest producer of aluminum, steel and other metals, and the biggest consumer of copper and iron ore, China is crucial to global metals markets which have slumped in the past year as Chinese industrial demand growth slowed.

China’s slowdown has hit revenue at global miners such as BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto, and the market is keen to know what China plans for its own state-run mining and metals giants – many of which have kept producing even as prices drop below the cost of production.

Graphite to be processed at refurbished Matheson mill – by Len Gillis (Timmins Daily News – January 22, 2016)

May 13, 2016January 22, 2016

http://www.timminspress.com/

BLACK RIVER-MATHESON – Production is expected to begin this spring at a newly refurbished graphite mineral processing facility in Matheson.

Great Lakes Graphite Inc., based out of Toronto, announced this week it has received permitting approvals for a micronization facility that will take raw graphite material and process it into a more refined and more marketable industrial mineral.

Paul Ferguson, the company’s chief marketing officer, said the Great Lakes is currently in the process of refurbishing the plant located on Vimy Ridge Road, located a few kilometres southeast of the built-up area of Matheson.

He said the company has a graphite mine property, that is not yet in operation, but that the Matheson plant is just what Great Lakes was looking for.

Potash Corp. sues over alleged flaws in construction of $2.2-billion New Brunswick mine – by Drew Hasselback and Peter Koven (Financial Post – January 22, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://business.financialpost.com/

Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc. is suing the engineering company that built part of its $2.2 billion Picadilly mine in New Brunswick, alleging that construction flaws have resulted in the “complete failure” of a mine shaft.

The Saskatoon-based miner seeks unspecified damages from Cementation Canada Inc., which was hired in 2008 to oversee the design and construction of two 900-metre deep shafts at the mine in Penobsquis, N.B.

The timing of this suit is notable, because Potash Corp. announced on Tuesday that it is halting production in New Brunswick and laying off up to 430 workers.

Potash Corp. spokesman Randy Burton said the filing of the lawsuit and the announcement of the production suspension is just a coincidence.

Trudeau’s rebranding of Canada offers sunshine to Davos, but it’s cold comfort for battered oilpatch – by Claudia Cattaneo (Financial Post – January 22, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://business.financialpost.com/

In a speech in Davos this week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau distanced Canada from its natural resource economy (i.e. oil and gas), and instead played up its economic diversity and its technology brainpower as part of his efforts to “rebrand” the country.

“My predecessor wanted you to know Canada for its resources,” Trudeau said in his keynote address at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss Alps. “Well I want you to know Canada for its resourcefulness. Our natural resources are substantial and they will always be a basis of the Canadian economy, but Canadians also know … that growth and prosperity is not just a matter of what lies under our feet, but what lies between our ears.”

Trudeau’s ‘Sunny-Ways’ marketing may have amused the Davos elites, but it’s cold comfort to the estimated 100,000 people back home who lost their direct and indirect oil and gas jobs over the past year, or their homes and businesses, or their life savings.

Dumb in Davos – by Peter Foster (Financial Post – January 22, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://business.financialpost.com/

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s sideswipes at Stephen Harper and Canadian resources at Davos on Wednesday were not merely unworthy, they were dumb. “My predecessor wanted you to know Canada for its resources,” said Trudeau during his less-than-sold-out speech. “I want you to know Canadians for their resourcefulness.”

Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi rightly took Trudeau to task, suggesting that one of the places that political resourcefulness is most needed is in supporting resource development, specifically new pipelines.

Any government so keen on infrastructure stimulus should be supporting the biggest potential domestic examples, but instead the Liberals are not merely continuing to peddle delusions of green jobs, they are facing a dysfunctional regulatory system for which their own posturing is partly responsible.

Union leader calls for national registry to track asbestos – by Mark Hume (Globe and Mail – January 22, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

VANCOUVER — With the number of asbestos-related deaths continuing to climb across Canada, a B.C. union leader is calling for the urgent creation of a national registry of public buildings and marine vessels containing the heat-resistant fibrous mineral that causes cancer.

Asbestos is now recognized as a hazardous material, but workers exposed as long as 40 years ago, when the material was widely used in construction and other industries, continue to be diagnosed with asbestosis and mesothelioma cancer.

In a recent statement, WorkSafeBC said the number of asbestos-related fatalities, which was expected to peak in about 2015, is still climbing, and the high number of deaths may continue to grow for several more years.

Vale N.L. plant processing Voisey’s Bay concentrate – by Ashley Fitzpatrick (St. John’s Telegram – January 21, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://www.thetelegram.com/

Company living up to commitments to move off imported material: province

Vale Newfoundland and Labrador is still in the process of ramping up to full production at its new hydromet production facility in Long Harbour, to continue for several years, but the company is using material from the Voisey’s Bay mine.

“The Long Harbour plant began operating on only Voisey’s Bay concentrate in early January,” a provincial Department of Natural Resources spokeswoman stated in an emailed response to questions this week.

In February 2015, a then-Progressive Conservative government announced an amendment to the Voisey’s Bay Development Agreement, allowing the company more time before it would be required to process product from its Labrador mine at the plant.

Project documents impacts from aluminum powder in miners – by Lindsay Kelly (Northern Ontario Business – January 21, 2016)

January 22, 2016

http://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Janice Martell hadn’t even heard of McIntyre Powder until a few years ago. Then someone suggested her father, Jim Hobbs — who had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease after three decades of working in nickel and uranium mines — could be eligible for compensation. She began to research. And what she discovered was a revelation.

Between 1943 and 1979, underground miners working at operations in Canada and around the world were mandated to inhale fine aluminum dust — called McIntyre Powder by the mining executives who established the practice — at the start of every shift, and cough it up before heading home.

Facing high rates of health claims from miners, executives thought the powder would coat the lungs, working as a preventive measure against silicosis, a respiratory disease caused by breathing in fine silica particles.

KWG Resources turns to China for help in Ring of Fire (Northern Miner – January 21, 2016)

January 21, 2016

http://www.northernminer.com/

A railway design and engineering company owned by China Rail Construction, one of China’s three major state-owned rail groups, is teaming up with KWG Resources (CNSX: KWG) to study design and financing options for building a railroad to the junior’s chromite deposits in the remote Ring of Fire area of northern Ontario.

KWG’s agent in China, Golden Share Mining Corp. (TSXV: GSH), facilitated the memorandum of understanding between the two companies, and will assist representatives from FSDI travel to Ontario in early March for initial consultations with First Nations groups and other stakeholders.

“This is in part driven by China’s desire to expand their rail construction industry globally,” says Moe Lavigne, KWG’s vice president exploration and development.

Brazil court orders closure of Vale’s Tubarão iron ore port – by Jeb Blount and Marta Nogueira (Reuters U.S. – January 21, 2016)

January 21, 2016

http://www.reuters.com/

RIO DE JANEIRO – A Brazilian federal court on Thursday ordered the suspension of activities at Vale SA’s Port of Tubarão because of pollution concerns, halting the world’s largest iron ore exporter’s ability to ship more than a third of its output.

The ruling by the court in Vitoria was made as part of a police investigation at the giant man-made port as Vale comes under increasing pressure over its environmental record in Brazil after a dam burst at a mine run by its Samarco joint venture in October, killing at least 17 people.

The court order paralyzed imports and exports at one of the world’s most important iron ore terminals. Its docks loaded 82.5 million tonnes of iron ore destined for steelmakers around the world in the first nine months of 2015, Vale said.

NEWS RELEASE: Shrinking land base for mineral exploration in B.C. puts future industry at risk

January 21, 2016

http://www.amebc.ca/

New report highlights restrictive regulations, lack of clarity in land access and use policies

Read the full Land Access and Use Report here: http://bit.ly/1QmyjNn

Prince George, B.C. — January 20, 2016 — The Association for Mineral Exploration British Columbia (AME BC) is calling for action on the part of the Provincial Government in the wake of a new report highlighting the shrinking land base available for the exploration of hidden and valuable minerals in B.C. as well as the increasingly complex government policies that exploration companies are forced to navigate.

Without ongoing exploration there can be no new discoveries, and without new discoveries, the future of the industry will be limited. As a result, thousands of jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars in annual economic impact could be put at risk.

Getting to grips with the lithium market An interview with Mr. Lithium.- by Peter Epstein (Epsteinresearch.com) (Mineweb.com – January 21 2016)

January 21, 2016

http://www.mineweb.com/

The following interview of lithium expert / consultant Joe Lowry of Global Lithium LLC was conducted over the past 6 days by phone and email. The opinions, views and purported facts herein are entirely those of Mr. Lowry. His vast experience in the lithium industry makes his commentary well sought after. I’m thankful that Joe is willing to provide insightful market intelligence, information that most investors don’t have access to.

You’re known as, “Mr. Lithium.” Please explain how you rose to lithium prominence? What does your firm Global Lithium LLC offer clients?

Not sure I’ve, ‘risen to prominence,’ but thank you for the compliment. The, ‘Mr. Lithium’ thing evolved over time. Almost 20 years ago, someone in Japan called me, Mr. Lithium in a group meeting and gradually the name spread. I lived in Asia for more than a decade beginning in 2000. I think some people found the, ‘Mr. Lithium’ moniker easier to remember than my real name.