The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North
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The incredibly interesting history of Juneau is a tale of gold, the persistence of a Tlingit chief and a series of chance events that allowed Alaska's future capital to grow and leave its mark on history, a story that continues to be written today. Juneau is home to some of the earliest large-scale gold mining sites in Alaska. But, if you were to ask the pioneers who founded the future capital that their settlement would become the seat of government in a future state of... Full story
Another Alaska gold mine could soon be owned and operated by an Australian mining company, according to a recent report in a highly regarded Aussie business, finance and investment news publication. Street Talk, a segment of the Australia Financial Review that provides daily updates on Australia's capital markets, recently reported that Federation Gold is in talks to acquire Coeur Mining Inc.'s Kensington underground gold mine in Southeast Alaska. Federation is currently a pri...
Coeur Mining Inc. Feb. 19 reported expansion of silver reserves during 2019 but a slight drop in gold reserves. Zinc and lead reserves were relatively consistent as infill drilling replaced depletion at the company's Silvertip Mine in northern British Columbia. Going into 2019, Coeur's five mines – Silvertip, Kensington (Alaska), Palmarejo (Mexico), Rochester (Nevada) and Wharf (South Dakota) – had 309.5 million tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 0.008 ounces per...
Coeur Mining Inc. Jan. 16 reported a fourth quarter drop in metals production at both its Kensington gold mine in Southeast Alaska and the Silvertip silver-zinc-lead mine in northern British Columbia. Kensington produced 29,736 ounces of gold during the final three months of 2019, a 13 percent drop from the 34,156 oz recovered at the Southeast Alaska mine during the third quarter. Coeur said lower grades and lower recoveries both contributed to the decreased gold production...
Mining and other trade organization leaders welcome the White House's proposed revisions to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), as much needed upgrades to the burdensome and often redundant regulations that are holding back investments into mines and infrastructure in the United States. "The mining industry is all too familiar with the project delays and escalating costs associated with NEPA compliance," said National Mining Association President and CEO Rich Nolan.... Full story
In November 1996, a little over 23 years ago, I began writing quarterly mining news summaries for the Society of Economic Geologists (SEG). Shortly after that, I began writing monthly summaries for this publication's ancestor, Mining News Alaska, and have continued both monthly, quarterly and annual mining news summaries ever since. With this summary, I have written my last Alaska update for North of 60 Mining News. When I wrote my first summary, Greens Creek was milling only... Full story
As the year winds down, mineral industry evaluations for 2019 are being published at a rapid rate. One of the most interesting such global reviews is EY Global Mining and Metals' annual "risk radar" for mining and metals, outlining what mining companies perceive as the top ten risks facing them in the near future. This publication stated that, for the second straight year, "social license to operate" remains the number one risk facing mining companies in 2020. This was... Full story
An abnormally long fall has allowed the Alaska mining industry to extend seasonal work well into mid-October, creating a lot of new information about project work conducted around the state. Exploration efforts, in particular, benefitted from this additional field time. Based on information available to date, 2019 exploration expenditures are expected to be in the $135-140 million range, well ahead of the $120-125 million exploration spending tracked for 2018. In addition,...
Coeur Mining Inc. Oct. 10 reported another strong quarter of gold production at its Kensington Mine in Southeast Alaska but a dip in silver, zinc and lead production at the Silvertip Mine in northern British Columbia. Kensington produced 34,156 ounces of gold during the third quarter of this year, which is a slight increase over the 34,049 oz recovered at the Southeast Alaska mine during the previous quarter and 27 percent higher than the 26,809 oz produced during the third qu...
Earlier this month Reuters reported that several agencies within the U.S. Federal government were "rapidly assessing" our domestic ability to mine and refine rare earth elements and utilize those 17 super cool elements in value-added products needed for a wide and ever-growing array of consumer and national defense products. Not surprisingly, mining industry officials demurred when quizzed about supplying information on where rare elements might be mined in the U.S. and how... Full story
Increased ore grades and improved recoveries bolstered metals production at Coeur Mining Inc.'s two northern operations – the Silvertip silver-zinc-lead mine in northern British Columbia and the Kensington gold mine in Southeast Alaska. Since achieving commercial production at its newly acquired Silvertip Mine last September, Coeur has been focused on increasing throughput, recoveries and grade at this operation just south of the Yukon border. These endeavors have resulted i...
In the famous words of Sherlock Holmes, the game is afoot! After seasonally slower news from Alaska's mining industry in March and April, the dam has broken with over two dozen Alaska mining project news releases issued in the last month. Including those projects moving forward that have not released their 2019 plans, Alaska has become a very busy place under the sun. All of our major metal mines reported strong performances in the first quarter, several of Alaska's most... Full story
As is usually the case this time of year, news about Alaska mineral activities is a bit sparse this month as planning activities are at flank speed ahead of next month's surge in field activities. That said, there has been a blizzard of mineral industry data released recently that has both direct and indirect applications to the Alaska mineral industry. First off, some internally generated data. Current public and private budget announcements suggest Alaska's exploration... Full story
Coeur Mining Inc. April 11 reported a dip in gold production at its Kensington Mine in Southeast Alaska and an increase in silver, zinc and lead production at the Silvertip Mine in northern British Columbia. Kensington produced 29,973 ounces of gold during the first quarter of this year, which is down 15 percent from the 35,335 oz recovered at the Southeast Alaska mine during the previous quarter but up 15 percent from the 26,064 oz produced during the first three months of 20...
Alaska Miners Association April 10 released "The economic benefits of Alaska's mining industry," a report put together by the McDowell Group that details roughly $1.26 billion in direct economic benefits from Alaska's mining sector during 2018. Healthy paychecks being brought home to more than 60 communities across Alaska is mining's biggest single economic contributor to the state. Alaska's mines, development and mineral exploration projects paid roughly $459 million to some...
Seeking economic and cultural prosperity for its more than 22,000 Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian shareholders while also looking to provide even greater benefits for future generations, Sealaska takes a balanced approach to developing the resources growing above and stored beneath its lands in Southeast Alaska. This does not mean the Southeast Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) corporation shuns mining or other resource development in its region, a nearly 600-mile... Full story
Those of you that attended the recent Cordilleran Roundup Convention in Vancouver can attest to the exuberant, upbeat atmosphere that pervaded the conference and was very much in evidence at the standing-room only festivities at our annual self-hosted Alaska Night meet and greet. But digging down under this veneer of optimism, many of the junior explorers and most of the producers admitted to their expectations of challenging times in 2019. Putting words to this apparent... Full story
Coeur Mining Inc. Feb. 20 announced that it has successfully grown its companywide reserve base for the fourth consecutive year, largely driven by the initial reserve declaration for its Silvertip Mine in northern British Columbia. Going into 2019, Coeur's five mines – Silvertip, Kensington (Alaska), Palmarejo (Mexico), Rochester (Nevada) and Wharf (South Dakota) – had 289.5 million metric tons of proven and probable reserves averaging 0.01 ounces per ton (2.8 million ounces)...
I, for one, feel vindicated, relieved and ready to face the New Year! How so, you ask? Please let me explain. For those of you who remember my column in November, I noted that EY Global Mining and Metals publishes an annual "risk radar" for mining and metals, outlining what mining companies perceive as the top ten risks facing them in the near future. This publication was for the years 2017-2018 and stated that "Our number one risk this year is digital effectiveness." If you... Full story
Coeur Mining Inc. Jan. 14 reported that its Kensington Mine produced 113,778 ounces of gold in 2018, falling short of the 115,000 to 120,000 oz the company anticipated from the Southeast Alaska operation. Coeur said lower-than-expected grades throughout the first nine months of the year was the primary reason Kensington fell short of the company's gold production guidance. During the fourth quarter, the Kensington Mine produced 35,335 oz of gold, 32 percent more gold than was...
WESTERN ALASKA Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. announced that it had finalized a surface right of way agreement with Alaska Peninsula Corporation for use of that latter's lands for the construction and operation of transportation infrastructure associated with the Pebble copper-molybdenum-gold project. Alaska Peninsula Corporation is an Alaska Native village corporation with extensive land holdings proximal to the Pebble site and more than 900 shareholders, many of which live... Full story
As Alaska's mining industry nears the end of another hectic year during which metals prices and investor sentiments rose and fell as precipitously as the world's major stock exchanges, the industry is naturally looking into its crystal ball trying to anticipate what the new year will bring. EY Global Mining and Metals does this sort of forecasting by putting out an annual "risk radar" for mining and metals. The idea is to find out what the industry perceives as the top ten... Full story
Coeur Mining Inc. entered 2019 with more silver reserves at higher grades, thanks to a maiden reserve calculation for Silvertip, a northern British Columbia silver mine the company acquired in 2017. While this newly built mine came with a rich resource base, a technical report and mine plan to elevate the high-grade silver resources to reserves had yet to be completed. With the information gleaned from a rigorous drill program, by the end of 2018 Coeur had converted some 58...
Extremely rare, yet a vital ingredient to emerging solar panel technologies, tellurium is the epitome of what it means to be a critical metalloid, an element that possesses the properties of both a metal and non-metal. "Most rocks contain an average of about 3 parts per billion tellurium, making it rarer than the rare earth elements and eight times less abundant than gold," the United States Geological Survey wrote in a 2015 report on this critical metalloid. "Grains of... Full story
It is no secret that much of the western United States was built on the back of natural resources found on federal land or within adjacent federal waters. Likewise, it is no secret that prior to 1964, resource development companies, and many other productive industries, externalized the cost of doing business by discharging often toxic waste into the adjacent environment without regard to the persistent effect of doing so. No one denies that over the past 50 years the...
