The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
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As we transition from 2017 into 2018, the weight of evidence pointing to a long-awaited mining industry up-tick is being trumpeted from every financial institution, brokerage house and mining pundit across the globe. For example, RBC Capital Markets' newly released "2018 New Year Preview" has this to say: "We are in the mid-stages of a stock market recovery and the early stages of an economic cycle recovery. Gold is already in a phase where it out-performs other financial...
Hecla Mining Company Jan. 10 reported that its Greens Creek Mine produced 8.4 million ounces of silver and 50,855 oz of gold in 2017. The mill operated at an average of 2,300 tons per day in 2017, a record which is about 15 percent higher than the throughput when Hecla became operator of the underground mine in 2008. Overall, Hecla's four mines – Greens Creek, San Sebastian (Mexico), Casa Berardi (Quebec) and Lucky Friday (Idaho) – produced 12.5 million oz of silver, 232...
With the price for an ounce of gold pushing back above US$1,300 to ring in the new year – along with zinc and copper selling at multi-year highs and trending higher – 2018 is shaping up to be a good year for Alaska's mining sector. Together, zinc and gold account for more than 80 percent of the value of metals mined in Alaska – silver and lead account for most of the balance. While there is currently no significant copper production in Alaska, the Far North state hosts signi...
From wide zones of high-grade copper and zinc in resource expansion drilling to a discovery hole with grades worthy of being compared to Greens Creek, Constantine Metals Resource and Dowa Metals & Mining's 2017 drill program at the Palmer volcanogenic massive sulfide project in Southeast Alaska is off to a great start. After investing US$22 million into Palmer over the previous four years, Dowa Metals & Mining Alaska Ltd. earned a 49 percent joint venture interest in the...
Hecla Mining Company Oct. 12 reported that its Greens Creek Mine produced 2.3 million ounces of silver and 12,563 oz of gold during the third quarter of this year. This Southeast Alaska operation produced 6.2 million oz of silver through the first nine months of 2017, putting it on pace to produce around 8.5 oz for the year. Mill throughput at Greens Creek averaged 2,391 tons per day during the third quarter, the highest since the mine went into operation in 1989. Overall, Hecla’s four mines – Greens Creek, San Sebastian (Me...
Mining's contribution to Alaska's economy starts with the hefty paychecks being issued to the some 4,350 miners that work in the state, according to recent study completed by the Alaska Miners Association and McDowell Group. The report, "The economic benefits of Alaska's mining industry," found that the average miner working in Alaska during 2016 received a whopping US$108,000 for the year, about double the average income across all sectors in the state. That is nearly US$470...
Alaska’s current fiscal crisis has highlighted the need to diversify the state’s economy and being one of the richest minerals jurisdictions on the planet, mining is an industry that could play a major role in future wealth creation in the Last Frontier. Alaska Gov. Bill Walker touched on mining’s role in the state’s future during a Nov. 15 address at the Alaska Resource Conference. “We have six large scale mines in Alaska, we would like to have 12,” he told the business le...
Hecla Mining Company has a long-running practice of replacing reserves it mines each year at the Greens Creek Mine, a tradition it continued in 2016 despite producing a record 9.3 million ounces of silver at this high-grade underground operation in Southeast Alaska. Going into 2017, Greens Creek had 7.6 million tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 11.7 oz per ton (88.9 million oz) silver; 0.09 oz/t (673,000 oz) gold; 7.6 percent (576,130 tons) zinc; and 2.9 percent (...
Dolly Varden Silver Corp. continued to expand deposits of high-grade silver at its Dolly Varden project during 2017. The deposits identified on this property exhibit both Eskay-like volcanogenic massive sulfide and Brucejack-like epithermal mineralization styles. In 2015, Dolly Varden published a maiden indicated resource of 3.07 million metric tons averaging 321.6 grams per metric ton (31.8 million ounces) silver in four zones - Dolly Varden, North Star, Torbrit and Wolf....
With world-class mineral deposits, paved roads and commercial power, northern British Columbia is considered by many as a great place to achieve a mining explorer's ultimate goal – find a mine. "The geology has been great up there for 100 million years, but it has only been the last five that we have had run-of-river (hydro-electric) projects, dams – literally billions of dollars of new infrastructure," said Colorado Resources Ltd. President and CEO Adam Travis. The start of...
Alaska's minerals exploration sector is on an upswing, thanks to Australian mining explorers looking north and mining majors upping their activities in the state. South32 Ltd., a Perth, Australia-based miner spun out of BHP Billiton Plc, is the largest mining company from Down Under to express an interest in Alaska's mineral potential this year. South32, which has eight operating mines in the Southern Hemisphere, secured an option to acquire a 50 percent interest in Trilogy...
Dolly Varden Silver Corp. Feb. 16 announced a C$3.5 million budget for its 2017 exploration program at the Dolly Varden silver property in northern British Columbia. This program is expected to include roughly 5,000 meters of drilling, with two-thirds allocated for resource expansion and the balance for testing outlying targets. The company also plans to carry out mapping, geophysical and geochemical surveys at the main Dolly Varden silver-zinc-lead project and the adjacent Big Bulk copper-gold project. To help finance this...
Hecla Mining Co. Feb. 22 reported that its 2016 exploration program successfully replaced the 11.9 million ounces of silver and 79,150 oz of gold mined at its Greens Creek Mine in Southeast Alaska last year, leaving reserves of both precious metals virtually unchanged. Greens Creek ended 2016 with 7.59 million tons of reserves averaging 11.7 oz/ton (88.87 million oz) silver; 0.09 oz/t (673,000 oz) gold; 7.6 percent (576,130 tons) zinc; and 2.9 percent (217,280 tons) lead. Roughly 8.3 million oz of silver and 46,500 oz of gold...
With winter programs winding down and summer efforts rapidly ramping up, it is becoming clear that 2017 will be a much more vigorous year for the Alaska mining industry than the 2013 to 2016 period. For example, my internal estimates are already pushing $75 million for exploration activity alone and a significant number of projects that have announced exploration plans have not yet announced budgets for 2017, so that number is likely to rise. Compare this to estimates of less...
Hecla Mining Company April 20 reported that its Greens Creek Mine produced 1.9 million ounces of silver and 14,022 oz of gold during the first quarter of this year. While this is down from the 2.5 million oz of silver and 15,891 oz of gold recovered at the Southeast Alaska operation during the first three months of 2016, it is higher than the company expected. This drop in metals production is primarily due to lower grades. Mill throughput at Greens Creek averaged about 2,190 tons per day during the first quarter of this...
If there is anyone still on the fence wondering if the minerals industry has started a recovery from the doldrums of the past four years, this month’s mineral industry activity in Alaska should settle the question with authority. During the past month, we have seen two merger/acquisitions occur, one by Solitario Exploration & Royalty Corp., which acquired Zazu Metals Corp. and its interest in the Lik lead-zinc-silver deposit. Then we also had Coventry Resources acquire V...
After nearly three decades of operation, Hecla Mining Company's Greens Creek Mine in Southeast Alaska continues to rank among the largest and lowest cost primary silver mines on Earth. On pace to produce between 7.5 and 8 million ounces of silver at a cost of around US$2.50/oz during 2017, Greens Creek is also the cash generating engine that powers Hecla. "Greens Creek continues to be the dominant source of revenue," said Hecla Mining CFO Lindsay Hall, during an Aug. 3...
Hecla Mining Company Nov. 7 said the zinc, lead and gold produced at Greens Creek more than paid for the production costs at the Southeast Alaska mine during the third quarter. As a result, the cost to produce an ounce of silver at Greens Creek was negative US15 cents from July through September. This compares to US$4.80/oz during the same period last year. The all in sustaining costs to produce and ounce of silver at Greens Creek, after by-product credits, was US$4.47/oz...
As the Alaska mining industry prepares for and kicks off exploration, development and production activities for 2017, the question on everyone’s lips at the recent Cordilleran Roundup mining convention in Vancouver, B. C., was the same: “Have we seen the bottom of this down cycle?” While signs of life were seen for short periods during the 2008 to 2015 period, the reality was an overall downward spiral of commodities prices and global demand. However, in a recent editi...
Hecla Mining Company Aug. 31 donated another US$300,000 to the University of Alaska Southeast as part of the Greens Creek Mine owner's ongoing support of the campus' "Pathways to Mining Careers" program. This program was created in 2011, when Hecla made an inaugural US$300,000 donation to develop a unique approach to engage local high school students and to educate and train them for future employment in the mining industry. Since that time, the program has been expanded to include adults new to mining. The program takes...
Coeur Mining Inc. has cut a deal to buy the high-grade Silvertip Mine in northern British Columbia, an acquisition that will add the first Canadian operation to the Chicago-based miner's portfolio of gold and silver mines. Located about 10 miles south of the Yukon border and roughly 150 miles east of Coeur's Kensington gold mine in Southeast Alaska, Silvertip hosts 2.35 million metric tons of indicated resource averaging 352 g/t silver, 9.4 percent zinc and 6.7 percent lead;...
For the first time in five long years, the mood at the recently held Alaska Miners Association Convention in Anchorage was buoyant, the result of a slow but steady turnaround on mineral investments in the state. Additional new corporate interest in the state emerged during the past 30 days, and sources of exploration funds coming to Alaska continue to shift, with estimates for 2017 suggesting that 62 percent of this financing comes from Canadian concerns, 18 percent from...
In early November, the Alaska Miners Association will hold its annual convention in Anchorage. Unlike the past four or five years, the excitement surrounding the convention this year is palpable due to the steady increase in exploration, development and production activities in Alaska in 2017. Clear signs of the industry's long-awaited revival include the fact that 11 new project acquisitions have taken place in 2017, half of which involve companies that are newcomers to the...
As the first snows of the coming winter began to fall at high elevations across Alaska, results of summer programs likewise began to trickle in from far-flung areas of the state. Meanwhile, second- and third-quarter production data began to show up and mining industry analysts released a series of reports covering a wide range of industry-wide trends. For example, SNL Metals and Mining Research released information on how long it takes to move a new discovery to production....
Dolly Varden Silver Corp. March 27 said it is collaborating with Hecla Mining Co. to carry out an airborne geophysical survey covering Dolly Varden's Big Bulk copper-gold project and Hecla's neighboring Kinskuch silver project in northwestern British Columbia. Hecla will serve as operator for the geophysical survey. "Cooperative effort between companies working in a region is a good way to keep exploration costs down while still achieving the exploration goals," said Dolly...
