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IN THIS ISSUE C IM MAGAZINE

MAY | MAI2015

May/Mai 2015 | 5

14Planning ahead

The Quebec government is eager to re-igniteexcitement for mineral projects in the north

By Antoine Dion-Ortega

62Crushing it at camp

Tips, tools and techniques for making the modernremote work environment work for you

By Katelyn Spidle

77Charged up

Battery-powered LHDs offer miners cleaner, coolerand quieter alternatives to diesel

By Eavan Moore

69cover story

The Kassandra complexEldorado’s Greek mines have a storied

past but face an uncertain futureBy Peter Braul

14

62

77

69

PRELIMINARY PROGRAMPROGRAMME PRELIMINAIRE

87

contenufrancophone

La version françaiseintégrale du CIM Magazine estdisponible en ligne :magazine.CIM.org/fr-CA

8 Editor’s letter 10 President’s notes

tools of the trade 12 The best in new technology

Compiled by Katelyn Spidle

news 16 News briefs 19 SGS Canada launches

its new REE separation plantBy Chris Balcom

30 The gold industry celebrates 10 years with the cyanide codeBy Katelyn Spidle

columns 40 How to weather the mining

cycleBy Ryan Montpellier

44 An update on harmonization of 2014 CIM Definition StandardsBy Paul Bankes

48 Good data key to paste plantdesign and operationBy Frank Palkovits

education & training 50 Goldcorp programs encourage

women to risk taking the leadBy Kelsey Rolfe

54 Burkina Faso schools gettingrevamped with help from aCanadian partnershipBy Katelyn Spidle

56 Healthy lifestyle program aims toprevent chronic disease amongmine workersBy Katelyn Spidle

60 President Roy Slack explainsCementation’s award-winningemployee-first safety cultureBy Ian Ewing

scholarships 84 MER recipients announced

By Chris Balcom

focus on genomics 92 The immense and untapped

potential of biological processesin miningBy Ryan Bergen

Illustrations by Alex Winch

mining lore122 A young girl in present-day

Quebec launched a gold rush tothe region in 1846By Correy Baldwin

113 Technical abstracts

travel120 Stratoni, Greece

By Peter Braul

article de fond104 S’adapter à la vie au

campementDes conseils, des outils et destechniques pour créerl’environnement de travailmoderne qui vous convientdans un lieu isoléPar Katelyn Spidle

95 Lettre de l’éditeur 95 Mot du président

96 Les actualités en bref108 Le complexe de Kassandra

Les mines grecques d’Eldoradosont chargées d’histoire, maisleur avenir est incertainPar Peter Braul

113 Résumés techniques

6 | CIM Magazine | Vol. 10, No. 3

19 104

50


editor’s letterEditor-in-chief Ryan Bergen, [email protected] editor Angela Hamlyn, [email protected] editor Andrea Nichiporuk, [email protected]

Section editors Peter Braul, [email protected] DiNardo, [email protected]

Copy editor/Communications coordinator Zoë Koulouris, [email protected]

Web content editor Maria Olaguera, [email protected]

Contributing editor Eavan Moore, [email protected]

Editorial internsKatelyn SpidleMichael Yang, [email protected]

Digitization technician Marie-Ève Lapierre, [email protected]

Contributors Chris Balcom, Correy Baldwin, Paul Bankes, Antoine Dion-Ortega, Ian Ewing, Sahar Fatima, Clare Mallison, Ryan Montepellier,Frank Palkovits, Kelsey Rolfe, Alex Winch

Editorial advisory board Alicia Ferdinand, Garth Kirkham, Vic Pakalnis, Steve Rusk, Nathan Stubina

Translations CNW, Karen Rolland

Published 8 times a year by:Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum 1250 – 3500 de Maisonneuve Blvd. WestWestmount, QC H3Z 3C1Tel.: 514.939.2710; Fax: 514.939.2714 www.cim.org; [email protected]

Advertising salesDovetail Communications Inc.Tel.: 905.886.6640; Fax: 905.886.6615; www.dvtail.com Senior Account Executives Janet Jeffery, [email protected], 905.707.3529 Neal Young, [email protected], 905.707.3525 Account ManagerMark Spasaro, [email protected], 905.707.3523For Quebec:Info-Industriel Inc.Senior Account ExecutiveYvan Gauthier, [email protected], 514.576.5869

Subscriptions Included in CIM membership ($187); Non-members (Canada):$270/yr (AB, BC, MB, NT, NU, SK add $13.50 GST; NB, NL, ON add$35.10 HST; QC add $40.40 GST + PST; PE add $37.80 HST; NSadd $40.50 HST); Non-members (USA & International): US$290/yr;Single copy: $25.

Tailings rehabilitation work underway at the Olympias mineCourtesy of Hellas Gold

Layout and design by Clò Communications Inc.www.clocommunications.com

Copyright©2015. All rights reserved.

ISSN 1718-4177. Publications Mail No. 09786. Postage paid at CPA Saint-Laurent, QC.

Dépôt légal: Bibliothèque nationale du Québec.The Institute, as a body, is not responsible for statements made or opinions advanced either in articles or in any discussion appearing in its publications.

Printed in Canada

2014

Kenneth R. Wilson Awards

Finalist

Best in Canadian Business Publi

shin

g

Last autumn section editor Peter Brauland communications coordinator ZoëKoulouris packed a camera and a voice

recorder, as well as some sunscreen, and flewoff to Thessaloniki, Greece. The final destina-tion was Eldorado Gold’s Kassandra mines onthe Halkidiki Peninsula. The sites, operatedby Eldorado subsidiary Hellas Gold, are a con-stellation of brownfield and greenfield proper-ties, some of which have, off and on, beenproducing metals for thousands of years.

Before Eldorado can turn these propertiesinto profitable operations, the company hasplenty of work to do: an eight-kilometre tunnelthat connects two of the mines and allows for

the transport of ore must be completed; tailings from past production willhave to be cleaned up; old underground workings need to be expanded; anopen-pit mine – a first for the country – must be developed and a processingplant that integrates the feed from three different mines built. Peter detailsthe work in our project profile, “The Kassandra complex” (pg. 69), a titlederived from the Greek myth of Cassandra, who was given the power ofprophecy, but whose warnings about the future were not believed.

The projects, which currently employ more than 2,000 people, mightseem like a great boost for Greece, which is way over its head in an eco-nomic mess, but politics have jeopardized the future of the mines.Supporters will argue that the project, where two of the mines have at least25 years of life, have a role to play in saving the country from its currentdistress. Shut it down and foreign investors will take their badly neededdollars elsewhere. Opponents contend the environmental costs will be toohigh and have the recently elected government as an ally. And so we waitto see whose warnings will be heeded and whose will be dismissed.

Spring is always a rush at CIM National as preparation for the annualCIM Convention reaches its peak. This year we added the publication of anew book, Metallurgical Plant Design, to the long list of projects and dead-lines. This volume, as co-editor Chris Twigge-Molecey explains (pg. 35),bridges the informational gap between engineering and project execution.The 12-chapter book is the product of countless hours of work from vol-unteers and CIM staffers and a testament to their enormous commitmentto their professional calling. Copies are available at the conference andonline at cim.org.

CIM’s media offerings have also expanded to video. Visitors to CIMMagazine online can now find presentations from a number of industryexperts who are challenging miners to weigh the risk of innovation againstthe growing risk of complacency. The videos capture the proceedings atMcEwen Mining’s quarterly innovation lunches hosted at the company’sToronto offices. The presentations, complete with slides, are graciouslyprovided by McEwen Mining and are an excellent complement to whateveris on your lunch menu.

Ryan Bergen, Editor-in-chief [email protected] @Ryan_CIM_Mag

To Hellas and back

president’s notes


Canada’s vital role on the global stageCIM members are respected internationally for our technical skills and

ethical approach to mineral industry development. It is our responsibility tobring this best practice approach to every country and every project inwhich we are in involved.

Responsible mineral resource development can provide immediate andsustainable improvement in the quality of life to many underdevelopedregions and countries. Taking this one step further, CIM, as the premiertechnical institute for the Canadian minerals industry, has a key role to playin promoting best practices for the global minerals industry.

Other technical institutes in the minerals industry, including the Aus-tralasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy; the Society of Mining, Metal-lurgy and Exploration in the United States; and the Southern AfricanInstitute of Mining and Metallurgy, share this commitment to best practices.Under the framework of the Global Minerals Professionals Alliance (GMPA),CIM is working with these organizations to “foster a mutually beneficialrelationship that will facilitate the exchange of knowledge and technology,promote technical and professional excellence across the minerals indus-tries, provide programs for education and professional development, andfacilitate opportunities for knowledge sharing.” Furthermore, each of theseorganizations will offer “Visiting Member” status for up to 12 months formembers who are living or working in a host institute region.

As this is my final President’s Note, I will take this opportunity to say thatthis has been a thoroughly rewarding and fulfilling year. I am profoundlyhonoured to have had the opportunity to serve as your president, and towork alongside the highly effective staff members in our national office anda dedicated team of council, society and branch volunteers. I wish to thankeach and every one of them for their support, commitment and a job welldone!

This month, Garth Kirkham will take on the role of CIM president. Garthbrings extensive industry knowledge and a high level of enthusiasm to therole, and I look forward to working with Garth in the year ahead.

Sean WallerCIM President

Taking the next stepWhen choosing flotation technology for a plant, mineral processors look for highrecovery rates and low operating costs. After seven years of development,FLSmidth unveiled its nextSTEP rotor/stator for use in forced-air flotation

equipment. The product consistently draws 10 to 15 per cent less power thanwhat were the most energy-efficient models on the market, according toFrank Traczyk, the company’s global flotation technology director. The teamdesigned the rotor/stator with horizontal slots, enhancing overall recoveryby one to two per cent. After testing more than 200 combinations, “Withthis particular stator/rotor combination we got better mixing, bettersuspension and a finer bubble,” Traczyk said. “Those fine bubbles reallyenhance the recovery.”


Military-grade refuelling systemMany remote mines lack the refuelling capabilityrequired to accommodate large aircraft on theirairstrips. That is why SEI Industries decided to makeits High-Pressure Aviation Refuelling System (HPARS) –originally designed for military training and operations– available for commercial use. The system weighsabout 1,800 kilograms and is built on a skid so it canbe easily moved. “It’s a portable system that[companies] can take with them, but it’s also heavy dutyand substantial enough that it can stay in one place fora long period of time,” said Robin Cnudde, thecompany’s Canadian sales manager. HPARS is fullyself-contained, weather-proof and explosion-proof. Italso comes equipped with a drip tank, a lightingsystem, an emergency stop control system and a fireextinguisher. Using a self-priming centrifugal pump,HPARS has a maximum flow rate of 750 litres perminute and runs on an electric motor.

Compiled by Katelyn Spidle

TOOLS OFTHE TRADE

Safe raisedrill carriersTransporting raisedrills and related machinery usinggeneric mining equipment can result in damage ordelays. Recognizing the need for a product that isdesigned to move them safely, Redpath introducedthe Redtrax raisedrill carrier to its fleet. It eliminatesthe need for telehandlers, load-haul-dump machinesand forklifts to do this work, thereby freeing them upto be used elsewhere at the mine. The carrier isdesigned to transport Redpath’s Redbore 30, 40, 50and 70 raisedrills, although it can accommodateother drills on the market. Its diesel fuel enginemeets emission standards and reduces workplacenoise levels. “Redtrax allows the team to execute theproject requirements independently from site to site,reduces damage of drill components as the unit ispurpose built, and safety features keep our workforceavailable to execute the client’s request,” said BryanMaille, Redpath’s raisebore superintendent.

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Copyright © 2014 Exxon Mobil Corporation. All rights reserved. All trademarks used herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of Exxon Mobil Corporation or one of its subsidiaries unless otherwise noted.

C

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A pilot plant for ablossoming sector

19

PDAC 2015: Mining’s rite of spring

26

A decade of safer gold extraction

30

CIM launches met plant design book

35

NewsPlanning aheadQuebec government eager to re-ignite excitement for mineral projects in the north

The Fraser Institute’s annual surveyon the mining industry, released in Feb-ruary, brought Quebec back among thetop 10 world’s most attractive jurisdic-tions to the sixth spot. The province hadpreviously enjoyed the first positionfrom 2007 to 2010 before tumblingdown to 18th in 2013.

However, provisional statistics re -leased a few days later by the Institut dela statistique du Québec told a differentstory. Mining investment in Quebecdeclined by almost a third in 2014, dip-ping to a five-year low of $3.2 billion.

Last year the current Liberal-led gov-ernment resurrected the Plan Nord, anambitious if nebulous natural-resource-focused economic development strategyfor the vast territory north of the 49thparallel. Since then it has been acting onmultiple fronts to convince investorsthat Quebec will be in an enviable posi-tion when prices recover. The PlanNord, initially launched by the Liberalgovernment in 2011, was squelched bya lost election in 2012 and a slump incommodity prices.

The feasibility study contract for athird rail line connecting the LabradorTrough to the Port of Sept-Îles wasawarded to Montreal-based Canarail lastOctober, thanks in great part to theimpetus of Champion Iron and AdrianaResources – and a $20 million budgetaryallowance from Quebec.

In December, Bill 70 finally brought tolife the Société du Plan Nord. Nine of the15 board members were nominated in

March. One of them is Hélène Lauzon,the current president of the Conseilpatronal de l’environnement du Québec,a non-profit organization bringingtogether various industries concernedabout their impact on the environment.“Our job will be to im plement the gov-ernment’s strategy for the Plan Nord,” shesaid. “It is our mandate to contribute tomaximizing economic benefits and advisethe government regarding any questionson the development of the north. We aregoing to have lots of meetings in the nextcouple months to set up the whole struc-ture, its rules and its budget.”

The Société was officially born onApril 1. On March 6, deputy minister of

mining Luc Blanchette returned from aone-week tour trip to Abitibi, Côte-Nord, and Nord-du-Québec, where heled various consultations with stake-holders: mining and supplying compa-nies, but also municipalities and affectedcommunities, R&D institutions andsocial and environmental groups.Blanchette has been conducting meet-ings since September in order to set up astrategic vision on mining development– the pièce de résistance of the broaderPlan Nord strategy.

The provincial government an -nounced its Plan Nord Toward 2035,2015–2020 Action Plan on April 8,which includes investments of about

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The Quebec government announced its Plan Nord Toward 2035, 2015–2020 Action Plan on April 8, whichincludes about $2.7 billion in infrastructure projects in the north.

May/Mai 2015 | 15

$2.7 billion in infrastructure projects by2035. Hydro-Québec alone will invest$10 million annually.

Among the stated objectives in theaction plan, the government will aim toresponsibly develop natural re sources inthe north, diversify the mineral resourcesector and increase the mineral process-ing capabilities of the province.

Mine Arnaud and the Côte-Norddilemma

Among the government’s efforts todiversify mineral production in Quebec,the phosphate-rich Mine Arnaud apatiteproject was considered by the businesscommunity and unions as one of themost critical for the Côte-Nord region’smining industry (historically dominatedby iron ore pro duction). The project –62 - per-cent- owned by the provincialgovernment’s investment arm Investisse-ment Québec (IQ) and 38 per cent byfertilizer giant Yara International – has

been struggling, however, to secure asocial licence to operate in Sept-Îles formany years, mostly because of concernssurrounding its environmental impactson the local population.

In February Quebec’s public consulta-tion forum on the environment – theBureau d’audiences publiques sur l’envi-ronnement – issued its report on theproject, concluding that it was “notacceptable in its current form.” MineArnaud made 17 new commitments afterthe report was issued to address environ-mental concerns. In addition to high-lighting ecological shortfalls, the bureaualso put in doubt the very economics ofthe project: It needs a phosphate marketprice of above $125 per tonne to remainviable. The current price for rock phos-phate has been stable at $115 per tonnesince September 2014.

The Côte-Nord badly needed goodnews after the successive closures of thePointe-Noire iron pelletizing plant and

news

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the Bloom Lake iron mine. The econ-omy of the region has been fully exposedto shifts in iron ore prices for decades.Many now consider Mine Arnaud abuffer to the local economy, includingRussell Tremblay, assistant director atDéveloppement économique Sept-Îles.“We need to bring back the people wholost their jobs, because we are going tolose them,” he said. “Mine Arnaud willevolve on a different cycle than iron ore.”

It seems that the provincial govern-ment, which has been frequently criti-cized for letting the region down duringcommodity busts, is sympathetic toTremblay’s arguments. On March 16, theMinistry of the Environment granted apermit for the $850-million project.Mine Arnaud is currently looking for athird partner to operate the mine. “Assoon as we find an operator, the sharesin the project will change and we expecta reduction of IQ’s share in it,” saidBlanchette. – Antoine Dion-Ortega


Industry associationreviews tailingsmanagement guidelines

An independent task force com-missioned by the Mining Associationof Canada (MAC) to review the asso-ciation’s tailings management require-ments held its first meeting on April8. The initiative was launched on theheels of a B.C. government investiga-tion into last year’s Mount Polley tail-ings dam breach, which sent 13.8million cubic metres of tailings slurryinto nearby Hazeltine Creek.

The task force, headed by formerMAC Board of Directors chair DougHorswill, is examining MAC’s tailingsmanagement guidelines and require-ments under its Towards SustainableMining (TSM) program and will makerecommendations where it deter-mines rules could be strengthened toavoid another large-scale breach.Imperial Metals, which owns MountPolley, has been a member of MACsince late 2012 and is in the early

stages of implementing the TSM ini-tiative, with its first company profileappearing in the 2014 TSM ProgressReport.

The current TSM tailings manage-ment guidelines outline best practicesincluding assigning accountability fortailings management to a companyexecutive, conducting periodicinspections to manage risk and hav-ing solid policies in place to ensurecompliance with laws and the TSMguides.

“There are areas on the design andbuild side that are not covered in theprotocols,” Horswill said. “I don’tknow whether they can be, but wehave to understand whether or notthat’s feasible.”

The task force is also reviewing thereport and recommendations releasedin January by the three-person panelappointed by the province of B.C. toinvestigate the Mount Polley breach.The report blamed a design flaw inthe tailings dam that did not accountfor an unstable foundation.

“An event occurred, which none ofus feels good about or wanted to havehappened,” Horswill said. “So weneed to understand, based on theinformation now available to us […]whether or not there are ways tostrengthen the TSM tailings manage-ment process.”

MAC’s seven-member task forceincludes Peter Lighthall, an inde-pendent consultant who formerlyworked for AMEC and Klohn Crip-pen; John Sobkowicz of ThurberEngineering; Nalaine Morin of theTahltan Heritage Resources Environ-mental Assessment Team; Alan Youngwith the International Boreal Conser-vation Campaign and a member ofMAC’s Community of Interest Advi-sory panel; Craig Ford of CorporateResponsibility Solutions; and TeckResources’ Michael Davies, chair ofMAC’s Tailings Working Group.

TSM is a mandatory programlaunched in 2004 for all MAC membercompanies to encourage them to oper-ate in a more socially and environ-

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mentally conscious manner. Memberperformance is assessed against 23indicators and results are publiclyavailable in annual TSM ProgressReports.

In a news release, MAC presidentand CEO Pierre Gratton touted TSM’s

success in ensuring the safe operationof tailings facilities but acknowledgedthere are opportunities for furtherdevelopment. “We believe there isalways room for improvement and weare committed to learning from theMount Polley incident with the goal

of ensuring we never have anotherone,” he said.

The task force will submit a reportwith recommendations to MAC bythe end of 2015, and the organizationwill then decide how to proceed. – Sahar Fatima

Junior achieverNioCorp Developments’ share per-

formance in 2014 earned it the distinctionof leading mining company on the TSXVenture Exchange’s annual top 50 list.

On Feb. 11, when the companymade the announcement, its shareswere valued at 83 cents, up from 25cents the same day one year ago. It alsohad a market capitalization of $102.68million, up from $24.1 million on Feb.14, 2014. Earlier in the month, NioCorp announced it had more thantripled the Indicated Resource of nio-bium pentoxide at its Elk Creek,Nebraska project to 572,000 tonnes, upfrom 177,000 tonnes.

As further proof of its strong per-formance, NioCorp’s common shareswere listed on the TSX on March 9.

The top 50 list is compiled by theTSX Venture Exchange and includes 10companies from each of five sectors:mining, oil and gas, technology and lifesciences, diversified industries, andclean technology. The rankings arebased on performance in four cate-gories: share price appreciation, tradingvolume, analyst coverage and marketcapitalization growth. – Katelyn Spidle

The 2015 TSX Venture Exchangetop mining performers:

Niocorp Developments Ltd.

Excelsior Mining Corp.

Nevada Sunrise Gold Corporation

NexGen Energy Ltd.

Roxgold Inc.

Ascot Resources Ltd.

Bacanora Minerals Ltd.

Kaminak Gold Corporation

Red Eagle Mining Corporation

Columbus Gold Corporation

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2

3

4

5

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May/Mai 2015 | 19

news

A pilot plant for a blossoming sectorSGS takes a measured approach to developing rare earth separation methods

SGS Canada completed construc-tion of a new state-of-the-art pilotplant in February to test and developrare earth element (REE) separationtechniques. The group plans to servewestern REE-focused companies asthey attempt to compete with the Chi-nese, who have dominated the marketfor the last 20 years.

SGS first began planning the plantat its Lakefield, Ontario site over a yearago. The company held meetings witha group of outside technical advisorsat the end of February to physicallyreview the plant and help draw upcommissioning plans.

The plant underwent commission-ing in April, and trial separations areunderway throughout May and June.Once operational, the plant will beone of the only commercial REE sepa-ration testing facilities in the world.SGS expects to offer a much greaterdegree of flexibility at its facility thanothers around the world, which can befound in the U.S., Canada, Australia,and China. “Other groups doing thisare at least partially funded govern-ment labs, with different agendas and

objectives,” explained SGS seniorengineer James Brown.

Of the two current western rareearth producers – Australia’s LynasCorporation and U.S.-based Molycorp– Brown noted that neither has com-plete REE separation facilities to per-form full separations for all their

elements. Jim Sims, vice-president ofcorporate communications at Moly-corp acknowledged that the companysends some partially separated prod-ucts to plants in China for final sepa-ration. Meanwhile, Lynas operates anREE processing facility in Malaysia.SGS principal metallurgist Niels Ver-baan pointed out that both companieshave struggled to live up to their initialpotential, and both suffered lengthyramp-up times.

Rather than attempt to bring clientsin immediately, SGS decided to firstfocus on developing its baseline tech-nologies and testing methodologies.“We’re going to learn lots,” said Ver-baan. “We’re also going to learn hownot to do it.”

The company plans to begin byseparating didymium (praseodymiumplus neodymium) from lanthanumand cerium, a separation that theybelieve will be applicable to most oftheir clients at some point in time. Inthe early stages, Verbaan and his teamwill use a synthetic feed but theyintend to switch to a real feed later intheir internal testing.

Metallurgist Guoming Qin examines a sample fromSGS’ recently constructed REE separation plant at itsLakefield site in front of the first bank of 30 mixer-settlers of the 120-unit circuit.

Courtesy of SGS

Canada


According to Verbaan, the pilotplant will use the hydrometallurgicaltechnique of solvent extraction, acommon approach to REE separation.The process works with two immisci-ble liquid inputs moving counter-currently; the metal containing aque-ous feed enters from one end, and theorganic solution enters from the

opposite end. When the two streamsmix, some of the REEs pass to theorganic stream, thus achieving a stageof separation.

“Because [REEs] are chemically sosimilar, many individual stages arerequired to perform one separation,”Verbaan explained. The new facilityallows for 120 stages, known as

mixer-settlers, which Verbaan said“should be good to conduct most, if notall, separations independently.”

The SGS plant is also physicallysmall, spanning roughly 2,000 squarefeet. Verbaan noted that this was a delib-erate move on their part and a “key part”of the design and operation.

The primary motivation for thesechoices was to control cost. The biggestexpense in REE separation testing isoften not in the separation testwork itselfbut rather in preparing the feed for theprocess. Naturally, a larger plant wouldrequire a larger quantity of feed. Withthis in mind, the plant has beendesigned to require minimal feed inputsfor testing. “By making this plant assmall as we physically can, we’re tryingto help our clients in reducing costs,”Verbaan commented. He expects around100 kilograms of purified REE precipi-tate will allow for around five weeks ofpilot plant operation.

Verbaan said one potential difficultyin operating small testing plants is thatdrawing frequent samples during theprocess can “disturb [the] circuit per-formance significantly” by upsetting theequilibrium of the stages. To minimizethis, SGS will use a portable X-raymachine to analyze key samples for con-trol purposes and then return the sam-ple to the stream as fast as possible.Fortunately, SGS’ Lakefield site is alsohome to a well-equipped lab that canprovide rapid turnaround times – asshort as one hour – using techniquesincluding inductively coupled plasmamass spectrometry.

While western expertise in REE sep-aration has fallen by the wayside sinceChina’s rise in the sector, SGS has foundthat there is still a good amount of accu-mulated expertise in North America thatneeds to be harnessed.

Brown said a “recurring theme” oftheir technical meetings was an impulseon the part of some experienced advi-sors, who had been involved with theindustry back in the 1970s, to passalong their expertise to REE engineers inNorth America. “They’re quite keen totransfer their knowledge to a youngergeneration and keep this knowledgehere,” said Verbaan. – Chris Balcom

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Looking aheadWhile it is impossible to predict the

future, it did not stop anyone from try-ing at the keynote session of the 2015Society for Mining, Metallurgy andExploration conference, where indus-try sages speculated on the challengesand opportunities for the industry inthe coming years. The discussionkicked off the annual event, whichwelcomed more than 6,000 attendeesto over 100 technical sessions, alongwith 670 exhibiting companies, to theColorado Convention Center in Den-ver in February.

All speakers agreed that technologywould drive innovation in the “mine ofthe future.” However, session modera-tor Peter Bryant, senior fellow of theKellogg Innovation Network, pointedout that the mining industry has pro-vided relatively little fuel. “The [min-ing] industry invests, by most studies,somewhere between a quarter to a halfof one percent on R&D,” he said, com-pared to industrial companies at 1.5 to

two per cent, oil and gas at five per centand aerospace at eight to 10 per cent.

Gwenne Henricks, vice-president ofproduct development and global tech-nology and chief technology officer atCaterpillar, emphasized the role bigdata and data analytics have had onmining innovation, a trend she said shebelieves will continue. “[The] expo-nential growth in computing powerand data storage provides us with the

opportunity to collect and analyze datathat can be used to ensure our produc-tivity across the entire value chain,” shesaid. “With infinite computing via thecloud, coupled with the explosion innetworking sensors, data can be ana-lyzed and provide real-time decisionsupport from the mine planner to theoperations manager to the equipmentoperator.”

Dean Gehring, president and CEOof Rio Tinto Minerals, agreed that datawill play a large role not only in tech-nology, but also in governmental regu-lation. He predicted a day in which thevast amounts of data that are capturedtoday by mining companies will besent in real time to regulatory bodies.“That starts to bring transparency to adifferent level than what we’re accus-tomed to,” he said.

Bryan Galli, group executive andchief marketing officer for PeabodyEnergy, highlighted the importance ofcontinued innovation by looking back.“Since 1970, coal used for electricityhas increased more than 170 per cent

Courtesy of SME

Ota Hally was named CFO of Endeavour Mining effectiveApril 1. Hally joined Endeavour in 2014 as vice-presidentand group controller. Previously, he worked at Pan AmericanSilver as director of finance.

Steve Wood is the new executive vice-president and COOof Sherritt International, the company announced on March24. Wood previously served as president and CEO ofArcelorMittal Mining Canada and has held various seniormanagement positions at Vale and PT International NickelIndonesia.

Agnico Eagle announced on March 19 that it made severalnew appointments to its senior management team.Ammar Al-Joundi, former CFO and senior executive vice-president of Barrick Gold, took over the president’s seatfrom Sean Boyd in early April. Boyd remains vice-chairmanand CEO. Dominique Girard was appointed vice-presidentof technical services and Nunavut operations, and NancyGuay will report to him after being chosen for the positionof senior corporate director of technical services. Michael

Timmins was promoted to vice-president of corporatedevelopment, while Carol Plummer was named vice-pres-ident of project development for the United States and LatinAmerica. Finally, Michel Julien was selected as vice-pres-ident of environment.

Teck Resources announced on March 17 that AndrewStonkus is now senior vice-president of marketing andsales. He joined Teck in 1998, serving most recently as vice-president of base metals marketing. Stonkus has more than30 years’ experience in marketing and sales within the min-ing industry.

Pershimco Resources announced on March 12 that it haswelcomed Angelina Mehta as representative of privateequity firm Sentient Group to the company’s board of direc-tors. Sentient has a 17 per cent stake in Pershimco. Mehtahas a range of experience within the mining industry includ-ing operations, finance, development and advising. She isalso a founder of the Montreal branch of Women in Mining.

Movin’ on upMovin’ on up Compiled by Katelyn Spidle and Tom DiNardo

Dean Gehring,president and CEOof Rio TintoMinerals, speakingat the keynotesession of the2015 SMEconference inFebruary

May/Mai 2015 | 23

as GDP has doubled and key emissionsper kilowatt hour have decreasednearly 90 per cent,” he said. The dra-matic improvements, he noted, havebeen spurred mainly by clean coaltechnologies and initiatives.

Next year’s SME conference will beheld Feb. 21 to 24 in Phoenix, Arizona.. – Tom DiNardo

Court rules Pascua-Lamacaused no damage

Barrick Gold’s embattled Pascua-Lama project received some good newsrecently.

Chile’s Environmental Court ruledon March 23 that the project in thehigh Andes has not damaged glacierswithin its immediate area of influence.

“We are pleased that the court hasconfirmed what the technical and sci-entific evidence demonstrates, thatthese ice bodies have not been dam-aged by activities at the Pascua-Lama

project,” said Eduardo Flores, Barrick’sexecutive director for Chile.

In October 2013 Barrick haltedconstruction at the gold-silver-coppermine, which straddles the Chile-Argentina border, in the wake of legaland financial issues. Earlier in the year,the Supreme Court of Chile ruled thatthe company was required to addressan incomplete water management sys-tem at Pascua-Lama. Falling goldprices and rising costs also factoredinto the company’s decision to suspendwork on the project, which was origi-nally set to begin producing last summer.

The Toronto-based mining com-pany has maintained it is committed toadvancing its $8.5-billion mine in anenvironmentally responsible manner.Apart from working with local com-munities to ensure environmentalrequirements are met, Barrick has alsoimplemented a glacier monitoring pro-gram at Pascua-Lama that captures

data from 27 different points and pro-vides the results directly to regulatoryauthorities.

Once in operation, Pascua-Lama isexpected to produce an average of800,000 to 850,000 ounces of goldper year in its first five years. – Michael Yang

Feds appoint CSRcounsellor

Jeffrey Davidson was namedCanada’s new corporate social respon-sibility (CSR) counsellor for the extrac-tive sector in early March.

International Trade Minister Ed Fastmade the announcement on the open-ing day of this year’s PDAC Conventionin Toronto.

“I’m pleased that we’ll have some-one as highly qualified and experi-enced as Jeffrey Davidson as our newCSR counsellor,” Fast said at theannouncement.

news


Davidson is approaching the end ofa five-year contract at Queen’s Univer-sity, where he is a professor of appliedmineral economics and sustainabilityand the academic coordinator of thedepartment of mining’s graduate cer-tificate in community relations for theextractive industries.

Davidson previously worked incommunity relations for the WorldBank and several mining companies,including Rio Tinto, and taught miningeconomics at McGill University.

Throughout his career, Davidsonhas been committed to working withcommunities and companies to “Findbetter ways to account for the socialand environmental concerns of com-munities and allow mining to occurin a responsible way,” he said. “[Theposition] looked very interesting,and I thought, maybe I can make adifference.”

An updated CSR strategy for miningcompanies operating abroad, releasedin November by the federal govern-ment, expanded the powers of the CSRcounsellor’s office to include workingwith the extractive industry to encour-age miners to adopt CSR best practices,as well as identifying and resolvingearly-stage disputes between compa-nies and neighbouring communities.The counsellor position has been

vacant since October 2013 when Mar-keta Evans resigned after four years onthe job.

Davidson will begin his three-yeartenure in mid-May. – Kelsey Rolfe

Noront purchases Ring ofFire assets from Cliffs

U.S.-based Cliffs Natural Resourceshas decided to step away from the Ringof Fire. Noront Resources announcedin March it would purchase Cliffs’chromite properties in the area as thelatter company exits the resource-richbut distant region.

The US$20-million deal wasexpected to close mid-April, subject tocourt approval of Cliffs’ restructuringof its Quebec iron operations. Franco-Nevada Corporation will loan US$22.5million to Noront at a seven per centinterest rate to finance the transactionin return for a small percentage of roy-alties from Noront’s Ring of Fire properties.

Jeffrey Davidson (right), Canada’s new corporatesocial responsibility counsellor for the extractive sector

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“This purchase consolidates theworld-class discoveries made in theRing of Fire,” said Noront presidentand CEO Alan Coutts. “We have madesignificant investments in the Ring ofFire and our team has become expertsin the region from both a technical anda social point of view.”

A crescent-shaped area locatednortheast of Thunder Bay, the Ring ofFire is considered to possess signifi-cant mining potential due to its richdeposits of chromite, platinum, nickeland other metals. But the area is notaccessible by road, and Cliffs halted itsoperations in the area in 2013.

The sale will transfer ownership ofabout 100 claims to Noront includingall of the Black Thor and Black Labelchromite deposits. The deal alsoincludes a 70 per cent interest in theBig Daddy chromite deposit and 85per cent ownership of a copper-zincresource near McFauld’s Lake. Norontalready owns the polymetallic Eagle’s

Nest project in the region and willnow hold about 65 per cent of theland included in mining claims in theRing of Fire, according to a newsrelease.

“The sale of these assets to Noront,an experienced mining company witha strategic interest in the Ring of Fireregion, further demonstrates execu-tion of Cliffs’ strategy which includesdivesting non-core assets and focusingon being the major supplier of iron orepellets to the North American steelindustry,” said a Cliffs news release.

Last November Cliffs announced itwas also pursuing exit options for itseastern Canadian iron ore operations.This includes the Wabush Scullymine in Newfoundland and Labrador,which implemented a permanent clo-sure plan in November due to a highcost structure, and the Bloom Lakemine in Quebec, which Cliffs is plac-ing under bankruptcy protection. – S.F.

Mining’s rite of springLike the gold price that animates

the event, attendance numbers at theannual PDAC Conference have comeoff their historic highs of a few yearsago. The gathering still attracted anestimated 23,500 people in earlyMarch, however.

Federal Finance Minister Joe Oliverused the occasion to extend the mineralexploration tax credit for another year.It allows companies that issue so-calledflow-through shares to pass a percent-age of expenses from exploration to

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shareholders who in turn can deduct them from their tax-able income.

The credit, first created in 2000, sweetens the deal forinvestors who might otherwise not take a risk on early-stage exploration projects. The annual renewal of the credithas become a spring ritual since its initial three-year periodexpired. The finance minister did, however, offer some-thing new, adding that the costs of certain aboriginal andenvironmental consultations required before explorationpermits are eligible for the Canadian Exploration Expensesdeduction.

The addition “is pretty significant because those costsare getting higher. Twenty years ago they did not exist,”noted PDAC president Rodney Thomas in an interviewwith CIM Magazine.

The federal government also committed to splitting thecost of a $785,000 study with the Ontario government foran east-west all-weather road that would connect the Ringof Fire and a number of First Nations communities to theexisting road that ends at Pickle Lake – around 300 kilome-tres to the southwest.

The current tight market thinned the number of compa-nies at PDAC, but some specialists said they were seeingincreased business. For example, a profusion of exhibitorswere marketing the services of unmanned aerial vehicles(commonly called drones) this year. Mike Reed, miningaccount manager for drone manufacturer Leica Geosys-tems, explained that miners’ imaginations ignite once theysee what imaging equipment attached to drones can do,whether it is monitoring previously inaccessible highwalls,providing an alternative to time-expensive inspections oroffering cost-effective surveying.

Nonetheless, market watchers did not tout 2015 as abreakout year, though they remain optimistic for thelonger-term prospects of the metals markets.

Martin Murenbeeld, Dundee Capital’s chief economist,suggested forces, such as a sluggish world economy and astrong U.S. dollar, balanced against bullish influences,would keep gold prices in the US$1,250 range for the nearfuture. Speaking of the broader metals markets at a well-attended forum, Murenbeeld argued, “We are in a verylong-run commodity cycle. Today is a mid-cycle correc-tion.”

At a separate session, Patricia Mohr, commodity marketspecialist at Scotiabank, predicted, “Commodity prices willbottom later this year but won’t bounce back. Wait until2017 or 2018 for the ‘bull run’ to continue.”

PDAC’s Thomas highlighted Goldcorp’s friendlytakeover of Probe Mines as a development that should addsome skip to the step of junior miners. Probe’s Borden proj-ect near Chapleau, Ontario, attracted a $526-million bidfrom the gold major earlier this year.

Next year’s PDAC Conference will take place March 6 to9 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. – Ryan Bergen


Young people can be inspirational. Occasionally we work with someone who shows great potential but whose future is limited by their education. More than thirty years ago I worked with a scheme that identifi ed promising mine shift-bosses, survey assistants, exploration fi eld assistants and similar people and awarded them a scholarship to complete a full-time university degree.

The successful recipients worked hard; some needed considerable remedial math and language training and had limited previous technical education, but they progressed well and all graduated as mining engineers. Their subsequent careers made a positive contribution to our industry. The oldest recipient was forty years old when he entered the programme, so gained more than twenty years in a professional career.

This human potential is all around us and it is not hard to identify. While programs like the one described may be diffi cult to establish, we can do more to develop such people within the workplace if we make the commitment.

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At AMC we aim to develop potential, within our own employees and with our clients’ projects. For more information feel free to contact me, Peter McCarthy on [email protected] or call one of our consultants in Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth, Toronto, Vancouver or Maidenhead (UK).

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Much has changedsince the InternationalCyanide ManagementCode was implemented adecade ago to help regu-late a practice that hasexperienced its fair shareof controversy. To date,231 operations in 41countries are certified,representing 60 per centof global gold productionaccording to the Interna-tional Cyanide Manage-ment Institute (ICMI).

The gold miningindustry came under fireafter a spill of cyanideand heavy metals from a tailings dam inRomania poisoned waterways in easternEurope on Jan. 30, 2000. Activists sub-

A decade of safer gold extractionIndustry celebrates 10 years with the cyanide code

sequently demanded the illegalizationof the chemical in mineral processing –a scenario the industry could not afford

to consider. Despitedecades of scientific re -search into alternativeslike thiourea and thiosul-phate, cyanide remainsthe most efficient chemi-cal for leaching gold.

In May – four monthsafter the Romania inci-dent – the UnitedNations EnvironmentProgramme and the for-mer International Coun-cil on Metals and theEnvironment, along witha number of other stake-holders, met in Paris toestablish the ICMI,

which would draft and manage thecode. Introduced in 2005, the codeoriginally included 14 signatory min-

All but one of Kinross’ operating mines are certified under the International CyanideManagement Institute, including their Fort Knox operation in Alaska (processing plant above).

Courtesy of Kinross

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May/Mai 2015 | 31

ing and producing companies. Trans-porters were not required to becomesignatories until 2009.

The code is voluntary and gives com-panies the opportunity to publiclydemonstrate their commitment toresponsible cyanide management. Tobecome certified, companies must submitan application to the ICMI and have a

report completed by a qualified third-party auditor. It is then processed by theICMI and posted to the website regardlessof the results. For 2014, code-certified

gold producers paid a fee of four cents per ounce of gold, transportersUS$1,000 and manufacturers US$6,000to be recognized as signatories.

news

FROM CRISISTO CONTROLJANUARY 2000 A dam breaks atEsmeralda Gold’s Aural mine near BaiaMare, Romania, releasing 100,000cubic metres of cyanide-contaminatedtailings into the Some� River. Thesubsequent public outcry shines aninternational spotlight on the goldmining industry’s use of cyanide.

MAY 2000 Multi-stakeholdersmeet in Paris for a workshop hostedjointly by the United NationsEnvironment Programme (UNEP) andthe International Council on Metalsand the Environment to establish asteering committee that will overseethe development of a best practicecode for cyanide management.

DECEMBER 2000 The first of fiveorganizational meetings takes place inWashington, D.C. to draft theInternational Cyanide ManagementCode for the Manufacture, Transportand Use of Cyanide in the Productionof Gold.

MARCH 2002 Completion of thecyanide code is formally announced atthe World Mine Ministries Forum inToronto.

OCTOBER 2002 The InternationalCyanide Management Institute isincorporated to oversee the code’simplementation and development.

NOVEMBER 2005 The instituteannounces the first 14 signatorycompanies have adopted the cyanidecode.

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Paul Bateman, the current presidentof the ICMI, explained that the codedoes not eliminate the risk of an acci-dent – in 2010, for example, NewmontMining agreed to pay US$5 million tothe government of Ghana for a cyanidespill at its code-certified Ahafo mine –but its emergency response planningand training procedures safeguardagainst major spills.

The World Gold Council, the Coun-cil for Responsible Jewellery Practice,the International Finance Corporationand the G8 all recognize the code asbest practice. Bateman said that evenuncertified companies model theiroperations according to the code’srequirements.

Dean Williams, Kinross’ vice-presi-dent of environmental affairs, agreedthat the code has become the newindustry standard. “Any responsiblegold miner of any size that elects not tobecome certified is actually making astatement that is contrary to most ofthe industry,” he said. All of Kinross’operating projects with the exceptionof its Tasiast gold project in Mauritaniaare certified.

The ICMI processed 117 applica-tions in 2013, which represents a 50per cent increase from the previousyear. Bateman noted that these num-bers are indicative of the program’sgrowth. To prevent a backup in pro-cessing times, the institute hired a full-time employee in late 2013. Thecurrent processing time for a report is,on average, 60 days.

Mines, transporters and manufac-turers are certified via a third-partyauditor that is knowledgeable in thesite- and sector-specific certificationrequirements. Code auditors arelicensed through self-regulating profes-sional organizations like the CanadianEnvironmental Certification ApprovalsBoard, for example.

“The code’s objective is to bring themines that are voluntarily adhering tothe code up to a certain level of per-formance,” said Kent Christie, managerof environmental affairs for Kinross.“When an audit occurs, it’s not withpunishment in mind if they haven’t gotit quite right, but to work with the

THE CYANIDE CODE: ICMI’S NINE PRINCIPLES

AND STANDARDS OF PRACTICE1. PRODUCTION Purchase cyanide from manufacturers that demonstrate acommitment to protecting workers and the environment through their participationin initiatives such as the International Council of Chemical Associations’ ResponsibleCare program.

2. TRANSPORTATION Clearly define the roles and responsibilities of cyanideproducers, transporters and distributors at every stage of the transportation processand ensure transporters have proper emergency response protocol in place.

3. HANDLING Follow accepted engineering practices and quality assurancemeasures for the design and construction of on-site unloading, storage and mixingfacilities.

4. OPERATIONS Implement systems that monitor the management of cyanideprocess solutions and their effects on the local habitat.

5. DECOMMISSIONING Prepare an effective plan for decommissioning cyanidefacilities that takes human health and the environment into consideration.

6. WORKER SAFETY Evaluate ways to reduce the risk to worker safety and ensurethat emergency response plans can effectively respond to incidences of accidentalexposure.

7. EMERGENCY Collaborate with stakeholders to develop an emergency plan thatensures the proper personnel and equipment, as well as emergency notification,reporting, monitoring and revision systems, are in place.

8. TRAINING Provide specialized training for workers and emergency responsepersonnel to ensure all parties understand their roles and responsibilities in the eventof an accident.

9. DIALOGUE Engage stakeholders and increase transparency through publicconsultations.

mine site to bring it up to that per-formance level.”

While the code remains voluntary,external forces are beginning to limitthe choice for many companies. Signa-tory mines must use certified manufac-turing and transportation companies,which has made bidding for large con-tracts more competitive. Batemanstated that both the InternationalFinance Corp. and the European Bankfor Reconstruction and Developmenthave incorporated code certificationinto its lending agreements with min-ing companies. In addition, Batemansaid that being code-certified isanother form of due diligence relatedto mergers and acquisitions.

Companies that become certifiedhave access to ongoing support andtraining from the ICMI in the properimplementation of the code. The insti-

tute also hosts quarterly industrialadvisor group conferences where par-ticipating companies can suggestimprovements to the code. “It wasnever intended for the code to be astatic document,” Bateman assured.“It’s in our best interest to have a sys-tem where we can evolve with the bestpractice instead of locking it in.” – K.S.

Greece adds hurdle forEldorado’s Skouriesproject

Greece’s new radical left-wing gov-ernment revoked the approvalrequired for Vancouver-based Eldo-rado Gold to complete construction ofits Skouries processing plant, the com-pany announced in early March.

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Project Pipeline Compiled by Tom DiNardo and Katelyn Spidle

Pretium Resources’ Brucejack project in northernB.C. received an environmental assessmentcertificate from the province’s Environment and theEnergy and Mines ministries on March 26. Thefollowing week the company signed a projectcooperation and benefits agreement with the Nisga’aNation, which includes commitments to the FirstNations related to jobs, contracts, training andpayments. The Canadian Environmental AssessmentAgency is currently conducting its review of theproject. The proposed underground gold mine aimsto achieve commercial production in 2017, and hasProven and Probable Reserves of 6.9 million ouncesover its 18-year mine life.

Teranga Gold Corporation’s Gora project in Senegalreceived environmental approval to begin development,the company announced on March 16. Over itsprojected four-year mine life, the heap leach project isexpected to produce between 50,000 and 75,000ounces of gold per year with average feed gradesexpected to range from four to six grams per tonne.

Stornoway Diamond Corp. began pre-stripping what

will be the Renard 2-Renard 3 open pit at its Renarddiamond project in northern Quebec, the companyannounced on March 5. The mine, which is expectedto begin commercial production in 2017, is projectedto produce 1.6 million carats per year over an initial11-year mine life.

The Kintyre uranium project, which is 70 per-cent-owned by Cameco and 30 per-cent-owned byMitsubishi Development, was approved in March bythe Western Australia Environment Ministry after fouryears of community consultations and environmentaland technical studies. The planned open pit mine inthe East Pilbara Region of Australia has a Measuredand Indicated Mineral Resource estimate of 55million pounds. Cameco completed a prefeasibilitystudy for the project and signed an indigenous landuse agreement with the Martu people in 2012. BrianReilly, Cameco Australia’s managing director, said thecompany will wait for market conditions to improvebefore beginning a feasibility study. The breakevenuranium spot price for the 2012 study was US$67per pound. As of March 9, the commodity had a spotprice of US$39/lb.

The newly elected Syrizaparty government had previ-ously stated its opposition tothe mine, a gold-copper projectoperated by Eldorado’s sub-sidiary, Hellas Gold S.A.

“We are absolutely against itand we will examine our nextmoves on it,” Energy MinisterPanagiotis Lafazanis toldReuters in January.

The revocation prompted afurious response from Eldo-rado. “The recent decision ofthe Ministry of Energy – if notreversed in a timely manner –may force Eldorado to reconsider itsinvestment plans for Greece,” EldoradoCEO Paul Wright said in a statement.

Eldorado also asserted the ministry’sdecision “has no legal basis” and said itwill “act to protect the legal rights of

the company, employees andstakeholders” if necessary.

The notice Hellas Goldreceived from Energy indicatesthe decision may be reversedonce the ministry finishes aninternal review process ofEldorado’s application to con-struct the processing plant, buthas not been clear on the tim-ing of the review.

Eldorado has spent morethan US$450 million since2012 on the construction anddevelopment of the Skouriesand Olympias mines on the

Chalkidiki Peninsula in northeasternGreece. It also operates a silver-lead-zinc mine in the area (see project pro-

Courtesy of H

ellas Go

ld

Installation of the SAG mill at Eldorado’s Skouries project in Greece

May/Mai 2015 | 35

file on p. 69). The company announced plans earlier thisyear to invest another US$310 million in the developmentprojects in 2015.

Eldorado said the approval revocation has so far caused “nomaterial impact” to the construction schedule of Skouries. – K.R.

Better results through design:Metallurgical Plant Design created to fill knowledge gap

Chris Twigge-Molecey, formerCIM president and current senioradvisor at Hatch, gave a sneakpeek into Metallurgical PlantDesign, a new book he helpeddraft and edit with metallurgicalengineers Rob Boom, FrankWheeler and Jack Young. Thebook contains chapters written by13 other metallurgy experts fromJapan, the United States, and Aus-tralia. “It’s truly a global view of

the projects business,” he said. The 200-page hardcover bookwill be launched at CIM’s annual convention hosted this yearin Montreal, May 9-13.

CIM: Why was it important to put this book together?Twigge-Molecey: We felt there was a significant gap in the lit-erature, particularly in the metallurgical field, where thereseems to be nothing at all. There are many books on the fun-damentals of engineering, project management and construc-tion management of projects, but there is very little on thedesign function itself of transferring fundamental knowledgeto a workable plant.

CIM: How do you account for this gap?Twigge-Molecey: It’s a gap by default. Plant design is notsomething that professors typically do research on; theywould be doing research on the fundamentals. And profes-sionals in the field don’t typically write books.

CIM: Why is this book particularly relevant now? Twigge-Molecey: It’s been in the works for a couple of years.The methodology we’ve laid out in this book is well knownand has been proven over and over again. It’s time to takestock of what we’ve learned. It’s also time for people and prac-titioners in the business to digest it before we get going on thenext cycle, since metallurgy is in a highly capital-constrainedsituation at the moment.

CIM: What do you hope this book achieves?Twigge-Molecey: Understanding. A lot of projects have beenunsuccessful over the past few decades because people madedecisions when they didn’t understand the consequences.This book is targeting people who make the decisions but

news

GIVING BACKPotashCorp announced in late January that acharitable campaign organized jointly by the com-pany and the Food Banks of Saskatchewan col-lected donations exceeding $2 million over the2014 holiday season. PotashCorp subsequentlymade an additional contribution of $1 million.Since 2010 PotashCorp has contributed $5 milliontoward the annual campaign.

In February the company also donated $150,000 tothe University of Regina for the third year in a rowto help improve the varsity program within the uni-versity’s athletics department. With the money, theuniversity plans to increase academic support serv-ices and training opportunities for athletes.

– K.S.

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who don’t come from a projects back-ground. They don’t understand howthe engineering part – even though it’sa small part of the cost – influencesthe total project: its capital cost, oper-ability and ability to meet the per-formance standards it’s expected to,like safety, productivity, environmen-tal impact and sustainability. – K.S.

Tough competition atannual Mining Games

The University of Saskatchewanhosted teams from 10 universitiesacross the country in February for the24th annual Canadian Mining Games.

From Feb. 18 to 22, 150 studentscompeted in 25 events and werejudged by representatives from manyof the games’ corporate sponsors,including PotashCorp, Cameco andImperial Mines.

Events were designed to be tough,explained co-chair Tanner Edwards. In

one challenge, teams were asked todesign a mine in seven hours. “It’sbasically an impossible task, so thetrick is to see how much you can getdone,” he said.

Other events tested a range ofskills, not just those pertaining toengineering: public speaking, finance,

math and the ability to workunder pressure were all on thetable. Most events finishedwithin three hours.

In the past, judges awardedteams a percentage-basedgrade for their performance ina given event. This year, how-ever, teams were given a ratingbetween one and 10 to make iteasier to determine the winner.The results were an nounced atthe final banquet: Queens Uni-versity took first place, theUniversity of Toronto was sec-ond, and École Polytechniquede Montréal came in third.

While stressful, the games were a lotof fun this year, according to Edwards.A banquet dinner and an excursion tonearby pubs were planned for eachevening. “It was just a really goodweekend,” Edwards said.

CIM was a silver sponsor of theevent. – K.S.

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6 Quebec 7 Wyoming 8 Newfoundland & Labrador 9 Yukon10 Alaska

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The Fraser Institute released itsannual survey of mining companiesrecently. The institute received morethan 480 responses to its survey, whichwas sent to exploration, developmentand other mining-related companies toevaluate 122 jurisdictions around theworld. To determine investment attrac-tiveness of each region, the Fraser Insti-tute combined its index rating ofjurisdictions by their geologic attractive-ness and its Policy Perception Index,which is designed to measure the effectof government policy on a company’sattitude toward exploration investment.Here are some of its findings:

–T.D.

Judging jurisdictions

May/Mai 2015 | 39

Median investment attractiveness globally

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How to weather the mining cycleBY RYAN MONTPELLIER

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Canada + 800 [email protected]

Complex geology, remote sites and technical issues are some of the engineering challenges faced in mining projects. Add to that obtaining the required social, environmental and regulatory approvals, and your project can experience unexpected schedule and budget overruns. Integrating your engineering and environmental studies can result in a more robust design and can streamline the planning process, avoiding unnecessary delays and costly rework.

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Given the current economic climate, asking miningemployers to implement a long-term workforce plan-ning strategy can be a hard sell. The mining labour

force closely shadows the volatility in commodity prices,with wild swings in hiring and layoffs. Not surprisingly, themining sector has already shed thousands of jobs in the pastyear. However, to soften the impacts of ongoing volatility,workforce planning and HR strategy should evolve fromshort-term, needs-based staffing to a strategic function thatenables organizations to mitigate business risks. This willensure the right people are in the right positions, with theknowledge and skills to meet business and production objec-tives, when the market recovers.One option during a downturn is to share human resource

capacity amongst projects, thus retaining key talent. Transfer-ring workers to better performing projects can help companiesretain high performers across operations and offer developmen-tal and career progression opportunities where appropriate.Although there are monetary costs for relocation, visas andtravel, these are balanced against those resulting from the long-

term loss of a worker, onboarding a new employee and thevalue of retaining an engaged workforce.Employees could also explore training or working in a

complementary, in-demand occupation during a downturn.This strategy allows individuals to take more ownership oftheir careers by planning for the upswings and downturns.One industry-based recruiter recently suggested that compa-nies could reduce the risk of losing recent mining engineer-ing graduates by recruiting and developing them as minersfirst. When engineering positions eventually do open up,these individuals would have the upper hand on their peersand would have developed a much stronger appreciation formining operations. The experience would be particularlybeneficial to those who will be advanced into a mine man-ager or other supervisory role. Another option to explore before a layoff is to take advan-

tage of various government programs designed to help mitigatechanging business conditions. For example, Work-Sharing is afederal adjustment program offered by Service Canadadesigned to help employers and employees avoid layoffs when

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tion support instituted prior to layoffs results in better atten-dance of affected employees and less disruption to productionand quality of work. Remaining employees are positivelyaffected since they experience less “survivor syndrome” andhave concrete evidence of the employer’s concern for workers.In some cases, employers may also support the transition

process by offering training or skills recognition services thatmake an employee more marketable to another potentialemployer. Over the last few years, we have seen Xstrata Zinc’sBrunswick mine, Agrium’s Kapuskasing mine and NorthgateMinerals’ Kemess mine certify their workers through the Cana-

dian Mining Certification program –designed to acknowledge the skills andcompetencies of workers in the occupationsof underground miner, surface miner, min-erals processing operator and diamonddriller – as one component of their respon-sible mine closure strategy. It may seemcounterintuitive to invest in an employeethat is moving on, but these organizationsfelt that it was important to reward the serv-ice of their employees, preserve the legacyof the operation and provide their employ-ees with a credential that will assist them infinding work post-closure. An additionalbenefit is that employees stay engaged dur-ing the transition, resulting in a successfulmine closure.When responsible mine downsizing or

closure practices are ignored, employeetrust is broken and these workers will notreturn to the employer in an improved mar-ket. In some cases, they may transition outof the industry altogether. The immediateeffect is that operations suffer overall, asworkers not subject to downsizing leave forbetter conditions, or in a closure scenario,leave early, preventing a successful and safeclosure. While it is challenging to make the shift

away from short-term or reactionary strate-gies, creative and long-term approaches toensuring our talent pool does not shrinkwill be essential for the sustainability of theindustry over the next decade as we look tothe next economic phase in the cycle andprepare to say goodbye to our many retiringworkers. CIM

there is a temporary reduction in the normal level of businessactivity. The measure provides income support to employeeseligible for employment insurance (EI) benefits who work atemporarily reduced work week while their employer recoversduring a cycle. When not working, the employee receives an EIbenefit, and, therefore, the cost to the employer is reduced sig-nificantly. The forestry and manufacturing sectors in particularare significant users of the Work-Sharing program.When downsizing is the only option, or a project reaches

the end of its life, there are well-documented practices that canmake this period of transition run smoother. Workforce transi-

Ryan Montpellier is the executive director of the MiningIndustry Human Resources Council (MiHR). He is arecognized expert and sought-after speaker on HRissues impacting the Canadian mining sector today.

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An update on harmonization of 2014 CIM Definition Standards

BY PAUL BANKES


M I N E R A L R E S O U R C E S A N D M I N E R A L R E S E R V E S

final Definitions Standards that were approved by CIM Coun-cil on May 10, 2014.CRIRSCO was formed in 1994 under the auspices of the

Council of Mining and Metallurgical Institutes (CMMI) to rep-resent CIM and its seven partner organizations responsible fordeveloping mineral reporting codes: the Australasian Joint OreReserves Committee, the Chile-based National Committee,Europe’s Pan-European Reserves & Resources Reporting Com-mittee, the Mongolian Professional Institute of Geosciencesand Mining, Russia’s National Association for Subsoil UseAuditing, South Africa’s South African Code for Reporting ofExploration Results, Mineral Resources and Mineral Reserves(SAMREC) and the Society for Mining, Metallurgy and Explo-ration of the U.S. With increased international exposure,CRIRSCO members agreed in 2011 on 13 harmonized coredefinitions that had drifted from the definitions accepted in1997 under the Denver Accord.For international practitioners reporting under multiple

CRIRSCO codes and standards, the core definitions in the

This column is the first in a two-part series that examines changesto CIM Definition Standards in detail.

T he CIM Definition Standards for Mineral Resources andMineral Reserves were updated in 2014 to harmonizeCanadian definitions with other members of the Com-

mittee for Mineral Reserve International Reporting Standards(CRIRSCO). The revised Canadian standard also incorporatesindustry, Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) and inter-national requests for clarification and guidance. This update isimportant for Qualified Persons filing public reports on Min-eral Resources and Mineral Reserves.The CIM Standing Committee on Mineral Reserve and

Mineral Resource Definitions, which I chair, maintains CIMdefinitions referenced by National Instrument 43-101 Stan-dards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects (NI 43-101) and rep-resents CIM on CRIRSCO. Following extensive consultations with industry, CIM

members and the CSA staff, revisions were incorporated in the

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11:08 AM

2014 CIM Definition Standards are now harmonized withCRIRSCO definitions as well as seven of eight member codes.In some cases, the core definitions are followed by additionalnational code or guidance. SAMREC is expected to incorporateCRIRSCO core definitions in 2015. The following examplesidentify significant harmonization changes that affect theCanadian definitions.

Mineral ResourceThe 2005 and 2010 CIM definitions of a Mineral Resource

differed from the definitions of other CRIRSCO members in twokey aspects: the inclusion of “solid material” and the exclusionof “reasonable prospects for eventual economic extraction.”The Canadian definition has always included the word

“solid,” but other CRIRSCO members omitted it. In 2011,however, all members agreed to include the phrase “solidmaterial” in their respective codes to address the recent report-ing of lithium brines as Mineral Resources. CRIRSCO mem-bers concluded that the nature and the risk associated withlithium brine estimates would be better captured by proba-bilistic definitions, considering porosity and permeability thanby the more deterministic CRIRSCO definitions.

In a similar fashion, the CIM definition has historicallyexcluded the word “eventual,” from the phrase “reasonableprospects for eventual economic extraction,” which had beenadopted by all other CRIRSCO members. The committeeadded the word “eventual” to the Canadian definition and pro-vided the following guidance:

Interpretation of the word ‘eventual’ in this context may varydepending on the commodity or mineral involved. For example, forsome coal, iron, potash deposits and other bulk minerals or com-modities, it may be reasonable to envisage ‘eventual economicextraction’ as covering time periods in excess of 50 years. However,for many gold deposits, application of the concept would normallybe restricted to perhaps 10 to 15 years, and frequently to muchshorter periods of time.While the committee acknowledges the word “eventual”

relaxes the definition by extending project timing beyond themoment of reporting, we believe the new wording is reason-able and accurately reflects current industry practice. The newguidance was inserted to limit the timeframe that should beconsidered by the required Qualified Person when preparingmineral resource estimates.

Mineral ReservesIn 2012 the UN Expert Group on Resource Classification

noted that the CRIRSCO template for reporting a MineralReserve did not identify a “reference point.” This is particularlyimportant when Mineral Reserves are reported as a product,such as clean coal, rather than as feed to a plant or concentra-tor. The following text was included in the new CRIRSCO andCIM definition:“The reference point at which Mineral Reserves are defined,

usually the point where the ore is delivered to the processingplant, must be stated. It is important that, in all situationswhere the reference point is different, such as for a saleableproduct, a clarifying statement is included….”The committee included the following guidance in the CIM

Definition Standards to assist the practitioner:‘Reference point’ refers to the mining or process point at which the

Qualified Person prepares a Mineral Reserve. For example, mostmetal deposits disclose mineral reserves with a “mill feed” referencepoint. In these cases, reserves are reported as mined ore delivered tothe plant and do not include reductions attributed to anticipatedplant losses. In contrast, coal reserves have traditionally beenreported as tonnes of “clean coal.” In this coal example, reserves arereported as a “saleable product” reference point and include reduc-tions for plant yield (recovery). The Qualified Person must clearlystate the ‘reference point’ used in the Mineral Reserve estimate.My next article will focus on the alignment of the Standard

with NI 43-101 for the permitted disclosure of economicanalyses. CIM


Paul Bankes is a geologist with more than 30 years of domestic andinternational experience in project development, mine operations, geostatistics,mine design and business development. Paul chairs the CIM StandingCommittee on Mineral Reserve and Mineral Resource Definitions andrepresents CIM on CRIRSCO and the UN Experts Committee on ResourceClassification.

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Here are three principles to ensure that the tests and advicefrom the laboratory provide the basis for sound decisions onpaste plant design and operation.

Experienced advisorsMany laboratory tests involving ore samples are straightfor-

ward. However, it is only through working with advisors –whether they are independent or in-house, who have experi-ence with the operational realities of mining – that a companycan gain confidence that the recommendations based on thosetests will actually work out. Experience-based advice will help

in designing, specifying andbuilding a paste plant in acost-effective way and guaran-tee that operations are efficientand economical.

Ask the right questions A test is not just a test for its own sake. It is unwise to have

laboratory testing of samples done in isolation from opera-tional considerations. It is much better to make sure that theright questions get asked about the situation the mine is fac-ing, and only then to proceed with next steps in developing aplan, which might include various types of sample testing.

Look for patternsThere are patterns to many things. Experience and obser-

vation can help point these out to avoid problems and toaccess available opportunities. Mining companies and their advisers need to look for pat-

terns in paste plant design and operation. This can include rec-ognizing what does and does not work in the mine operation,geology and metallurgy that feed the backfill system. Throughpatterns and experience, lab testing can give an indication ofwhat flow sheet options exist. This can then be followed by ascreening study from which two different parameters can betested, to see how those affect results. This leads to a final suiteof testing to prove which direction is best. This is an iterative approach that is time and money well

spent – because at this point we are not tweaking $50,000 ona choice of pump, but entire flow sheets and entire largeplants. The right design upfront should generate much higherpayback, reduce risk and improve the environmental aspect,resulting in greater shareholder value. CIM

A tailings-thickening operation is an integral part of anoverall mine plan. It is therefore essential to base itsdesign on good data. If not, it can result in wasted

weeks and dollars.A couple of years ago, a representative from a testing labo-

ratory at an underground mine, who had examined some rocksamples, called our company in to discuss problems he washaving with the performance of the tailings in the paste plant.The mine had started as an open pit to extract the surface orebut was later converted to an underground operation to get atthe deeper resource.

The story that emerged caused considerable embarrass-ment for those involved and turned on that fact that ore typesdiffer in mines over time – common knowledge among expe-rienced miners or geologists. To explain: Weathering causessignificant changes to the characteristics of rock near the sur-face, creating oxidized caps. This means that there can be significant differences

between the near-surface rock, such as that which had beenencountered by the open pit mine, and the deeper rock thatwould be removed by the underground mine. The problem was that ore samples used in the laboratory

testing had come from the near-surface open pit mine; theydid not come from the depths that would be reached by theunderground mine. It was the underground mine that wouldgenerate the tailings to be used in the paste plant and, eventu-ally, for backfilling.Because the samples used in the tests were not relevant to

the rock that would be processed through the tailings plant,the whole testing program had to be scrapped and redoneusing tailings from the same ore type as would be encounteredby the underground mine. This problem could have been averted through consulta-

tion with experienced professionals including the mine’s oper-ations people, the geologist, the metallurgist, or mineengineers. A mine plan arranged by year, ore type, blends andtailings generation might have pointed out the difference incurrent and future tailings characteristics, and suggested theproper design of the backfill plant or tailings disposal plant.The testing of samples needs to done in a way that takes

into account the operational situation because the data fromthose samples will be used to drive decisions.

“The testing of samples needs to done in a way that takes into account the operational situation because

the data from those samples will be used to drive decisions.”

Good data key to paste plant design and operation

BY FRANK PALKOVITS


S A M P L I N G

Frank Palkovits, P.Eng., is president of Kovit Engineering Ltd., which providesmine backfill and tailings management, including strategic studies, consultingto detail engineering services, plant design and [email protected]

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When, in 2007 and 2008, Anna Tudela toured Gold-corp’s recently acquired assets in Mexico and inCentral and South America, she saw many womenworking on mine sites whose talents seemed

underused and whose careers appeared stalled. They were, thecompany’s vice-president of regulatory affairs and corporatesecretary, recalled, “shy or not pushing hard enough to be rec-ognized,” and were limited in career advancement because ofit. The experience compelled Tudela to help women developtheir confidence and succeed at the company. Women are a clear minority at Goldcorp. According to the

company’s 2013 diversity report, women make up 12 per centof Goldcorp’s overall workforce. Tudela said women comprise20 per cent of the seats on the board of directors and 23 percent of the executive management team.Women currently represent 14 per cent of the Canadian

mining sector workforce and 12.3 per cent of senior roles,according to WIM Canada. “I saw the need to do somethingabout helping every woman at [Goldcorp], at every level of thecompany, to develop their leadership skills and potential,” saidTudela. She founded the Creating Choices program at Goldcorp in

2010 to address the issue. The program, a two-day profes-sional development seminar for women, runs year-round andhelps participants build confidence and self esteem whileencouraging them to set professional goals and take on leader-ship roles.

Real world resultsSince its inception, the program has graduated more than

1,200 women across all the countries Goldcorp operates in,and its success prompted Tudela to launch a new phase thisyear, aptly called Growing Choices. Following up on the skillstaught in Creating Choices, the newly rolled out second phaseteaches participants how to “brand themselves as leaders,”

plan for career success, and network and build relationshipsthat will help advance their careers.Tudela said she feels the program is necessary because it

encourages women to constantly take chances and opportunities they might not have otherwise. “A lot of thetimes we’re afraid to put our foot forward and say, ‘I want totake this challenge, I want to do this,’” she said, “because wefeel we have to first make sure that we are overqualified beforewe say we’re ready.”Boi Linh Van, the engineering team leader at Goldcorp’s

Musselwhite gold mine in Opapimiskan Lake, Ontario, and aCreating Choices graduate, understands that feeling. She gotinvolved with the program in 2011 when she was living in Van-couver, spending a year job-shadowing Goldcorp’s COO at thehead office. But the decision to apply for that opportunity in thefirst place, she said, was a tough one. “I didn’t know if I could do [the job], but a lot of my col-

leagues said, ‘Yeah, you should, it’s an opportunity and you’dbe good at it,’” she recalled. “I had worked at the company forquite a number of years and it never occurred to me to thinkabout moving forward, think about my career, [and] thinkabout where I want to go.”Van, who joined Goldcorp in 2003 as an engineering intern

and described herself as “more introverted,” reached out toTudela once she was in Vancouver and signed up for the pro-gram. She said it taught her to be more open to taking chances. “It might’ve taken me years to take other opportunities

[before], whereas now I know that it’s okay, even if I am notperfect or things don’t go as well,” she said. “You’ve gotta putyourself out there.”

A homegrown opportunityWhen she was planning Creating Choices in 2010, Tudela

invited 16 women, one from each of Goldcorp’s operations andregional offices, to Vancouver to brainstorm the most effective

In praise of upwardmobilityPrograms encouragewomen at Goldcorp torisk taking the leadBy Kelsey Rolfe

Goldcorp’s Growing Choices programhelps women develop as leaders.

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upfrontE D U C A T I O N & T R A I N I N G

program for women in the company. Gold-corp partnered with communications firmThe Humphrey Group and modified itsexisting four-module program to fit Gold-corp’s culture. “We needed to bring theprogram home where women could iden-tify themselves with the examples and day-to-day life experiences,” Tudela said.

The result was a six-module programrecorded in English and Spanish withvideo components.

The first few modules of CreatingChoices teach women to build on theirself-esteem, set future career goals forthemselves and take chances that theymight normally believe they are not pre-pared for. The last three focus on leader-ship-specific skills: communicatingeffectively and what Tudela called “achiev-ing a leader’s presence.”

As well as Creating and GrowingChoices, the program also has a third com-ponent, which pairs the women who have participated inworkshops with a mentor in the company. Based on a woman’sresumé, experience, and career goals, Tudela pairs her with a

mentor higher up in the company, and they have a meeting ora conference call once every two months for a year to discussprofessional development. Both men and women can mentor,

May/Mai 2015 | 51

Anna Tudela saw an opportunity to help womenacross the company to grow their careers.

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okay to jump around to different areas. It pushed me and chal-lenged me to see that change management is something I’mreally interested in.”

Exclusively for womenWhile Tudela pairs mentees with both male and female

mentors, the Creating Choices program trainers are exclusivelywomen, as are the participants. Though Tudela said she hasheard men at the company express an interest in participating,she has kept Creating and Growing Choices a women-onlyprogram. The reason, she said, is having men present mightdiscourage women from speaking up.

“You can see the mechanics anywhere,” she said. “Youattend a meeting where it’s two women and 10 men, womendo not say anything unless [...] they’re strong characters, butmost of the time they go quiet. You put those two women withanother 10 women and everybody at the table will be talking.”

For participants, a sense of friendship and a networkremain after the program ends. “Over the course of the twodays you gain a lot of confidence with the group thatyou’re with and it’s a very supportive environment,” Gat-tens said. “All the women are in the same boat, so it’s a safeplace to work through all those different challenges that wehave as women in the mining industry, and share storiesand experiences.” CIM

but Tudela said she makes sure mentees and their mentors arenever working at the same operation.

Rather than bringing in external teachers for the program,Goldcorp took the approach of training women within thecompany to be program facilitators before sending them backto their respective mine sites to offer Creating Choices there.

Kaeli Gattens, a coordinator of change management inGoldcorp’s Mexico City office, was among those women.While working as an investor relations intern at Goldcorp’shead office in 2012, she met Tudela, who encouraged her tojoin the facilitators group.

“I’d started off quite young at the company, and part ofthose [modules], gaining confidence and learning how to useyour voice, really spoke to me,” Gattens recalled. “Once I wasin the actual course with the other women, I knew that wasexactly what I needed to develop my skills and to grow as anemployee at Goldcorp.”

After her internship, Gattens started working full time incorporate communications, and then in 2014 made a bigmove down to Mexico. She said the skills she learned from theprogram encouraged her to take the job, even though it was avery different role.

“It was a really tough decision to make because I thought Iwas going to be sticking with communications and investorrelations,” she said, “but [the program] showed me [...] that it’s


Iamgold, Plan Canada, and the Department of ForeignAffairs, Trade and Development (DFATD) have pooled theirresources to support the development and strengthening ofthe educational and employment sectors in Burkina Faso.

The three organizations have contributed $1 million,$900,000 and $5.6 million, respectively, to a project that hasso far seen 11 pre-vocational centres rehabilitated and twocompletely rebuilt. Though the project has faced criticism thatthe Canadian government is funding CSR projects for miningcompanies, “the results have been extremely positive so far,”said Iamgold’s director of corporate social responsibility (CSR),Aaron Steeghs.

The Burkina Faso workforce is presently ill-prepared totake on the country’s industrial output, which is growing atabout 6.5 per cent. Education levels and literacy rates are poor:children can expect only about eight years of schooling in totaland consequently only about 29 per cent of people over 15years old can read and write. It is with that in mind that thesix-year pilot project is meant to develop educational andtraining opportunities for youth, and help create a steady flowof workers with transferable skills.

The idea grew out of a 2007 workshop led by the Univer-sity of Toronto that examined cross-sector partnershipsthrough a case study of the Kimberley process for conflict dia-monds. After the initial workshop, it took close to three yearsof relationship building before the Burkina Faso project pro-posal was drawn up and executed.

“We have a lot of CSR projects around the mine site to sup-port local communities, but this is a national-level initiative,”Steeghs said. “At a national level, almost all companies makesome contributions to philanthropy. We thought this would bea lot more meaningful and impactful, in an area where we canreally add value beyond writing a cheque. That’s been the funpart; this project is about a lot more than just making a finan-cial contribution.”

Renovations boost enrolmentThe centres getting help are pre-professional vocational

schools for youth aged between 13 and 18. The facilities,located in the southwest and north-central regions of thecountry, were long-neglected and offered little value in termsof employment preparation.

Nadine Grant, director of programs for Plan Canada,explained that before the renovations were completed, class-rooms were missing necessary equipment like motorcycleparts for the motorcycle mechanic program. The centres hadpoor attendance rates and reputations. Grant also noted thatparents were not proud to send their teens there to study.

“Now that we have renovated them, we’ve made the cur-riculum easier to understand for the young people,” she said,pointing out that the revamped curricula were informed bymarket research surveys. “We actually have tools that they canuse so that they leave with very marketable skills,” she contin-ued. “Exam scores have really increased and the enrolmentrate has increased.”

There are now several programs being offered – sewing,welding, carpentry, and electrical maintenance, for example –

SchoolsretooledPartnership betweenminer, NGO and federalgovernment revampseducational facilities inBurkina Faso By Katelyn Spidle

Upgraded educational facilities inBurkina Faso will help the

workforce prepare to join thecountry's growing economy.

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that generally take four years to complete. Plan Canada re trained 101 Burkinabé teachers, and the facilities are run bythe Burkina Faso Ministry of Education. As of September2014, DFATD reported that 2,867 students had enrolled intechnical, vocational and educational training centres since theproject began. “The Ministry of Education loves this projectbecause it reignites something they had that wasn’t performingstrongly,” Grant said.

A window into the mining workplaceNeither Grant nor Steeghs could confirm how many youth

have succeeded in finding a job upon graduation, due prima-rily to data tracking challenges in that context. However, bothemphasized that none have been employed at Iamgold’sEssakane mine, located in the northeastern part of the coun-try. That is not a goal of the project, and Essakane leads min-ing-specific training in the region of operation.

Iamgold’s mine, however, plays a critical role in offeringstudents real-world learning opportunities.

For the past three years, Iamgold has been sending Essakaneemployees – always Burkinabé and often women in non- traditional roles – to give presentations and workshops at thecentres. The presenters offer students the chance to pick theirbrains and gather insight into what it would be like to work intheir field and to hold a job in a professional environment.

One of the workshops evolved into an internship programwhere students gain experience with local businesses,Iamgold, and other mining companies across the country.Iamgold, in particular, has hosted more than 100 studentsannually for the past two years, usually in cohorts of 20 or so.

“These students have never really seen a work environ-ment that resembles a large-scale industrial mine,” Steeghssaid, explaining that the internship is “an intense crash coursein the life skills that are a little bit harder to teach in a schoolenvironment, as well as a look at what you can do with voca-tional training and the opportunities that are out there.”

Iamgold buses in the students from as far away as a fewhundred kilometres to spend one week touring the mine, ask-ing questions and testing their practical skills.

Looking toward a prosperous futureThe project’s overall goal is to leverage the renovated cen-

tres to enroll 3,390 in pre-vocational centres and 6,400 in pro-fessional training centres, and to create 525 internships. Thepartners want to ensure that a minimum of 525 graduatesbecome either employed or self-employed by 2017.

In the meantime, Iamgold and Plan Canada have spent thelast two years building a CSR forum in Burkina Faso that willpull mining companies and NGOs together to discuss criticalissues and to bring in external expertise.

“Formal mining is not that old in Burkina Faso,” Grantsaid. “As a result, we’re only just starting to unpack issues likeCSR. This network is trying to increase the understanding ofsome of these concepts across the mining community, theNGO community and the private sector, so that we can get onboard in terms of a responsible approach to mining.” CIM

May/Mai 2015 | 55


The government of the Northwest Territories haslaunched a program to help companies encouragehealthy lifestyle choices among aboriginal men: thepeople it believes are least likely to access the health

care system. And local diamond miners, among the largest pri-vate employers in the N.W.T., are joining the effort.

The Working on Wellness program (WoW) was modelledon a module-based approach that proved successful in B.C.and Yukon. The N.W.T. initiative devotes a few months at atime toward promoting a specific wellness topic – such asnutrition, physical activity, mental health, tobacco cessation orUV awareness – inside participating workplaces. WoW is

Well-beingin the northgets a boostHealthy lifestyle programaims to prevent chronicdisease By Katelyn Spidle

Diavik’s nutrition module of the Working onWellness program begins in May.

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KNOWLEDGE. EXPERIENCE. EXCELLENCE.Providing client-focused sustainable solutions to the mining industry.

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structured in such a way that it can beadapted to each worksite. Employees deter-mine which topics get focus by detailingtheir preferences in a baseline survey.

The program is a partnership betweenthe BC Healthy Living Alliance, the Cana-dian Cancer Society, B.C. and Yukon, theCouncil of Yukon First Nations and theChronic Disease Prevention Alliance ofCanada, and is jointly funded by the Cana-dian Partnership Against Cancer, the Heartand Stroke Foundation, and HealthCanada.

Dr. Kami Kandola, deputy chief publichealth officer of the Northwest Territories,felt that the best way to extend health careaccess to aboriginal men was to approachmajor mining companies. The fly-in/fly-outschedule of a remote mining workplace provided the ideal set-ting to test WoW’s potential to influence the long-term choicesemployees make both in and out of the workplace that affecttheir health. “Someone comes here and has access to the bestfacilities and the best food, but how do you sustain these changeswhen they go home where they don’t have the same access?”Kandola said. “That’s something the mines have in mind.”

Diavik Diamond Mines, Dominion Diamond Ekati and DeBeers Group agreed to participate in the pilot program, whichwill last until September 2016. At Diavik, where the workforceis 89 per cent male and 24.1 per cent aboriginal, employeessurveyed last summer expressed an overwhelming desire formore resources related to physical activity, proper nutritionand mental health. These will make up the first three modulesof the pilot program.

The physical activity module at Diavik began with “MapOur Fitness,” which asks employees to commit to 10 minutesof physical activity three times per week over the course of thefour months. “It’s not the Health Canada, 30-minutes-per-dayrecommendation, but what we decided is that we want toreally target the people who are not doing anything, just tomake it a reasonable goal,” explained Cara Benoit, occupa-tional hygienist at Diavik. The company will help employeesbrainstorm ideas for physical activities, such as walking, yogaor push-ups.

Participants were gifted an elastic band that offers lightresistance for exercise and a pedometer, and entered into aprize draw. “We’re hoping that there’s going to be an effect ofincreased morale,” said Benoit. “We’re trying to show that wecare about their health.”

The physical activity module was implemented in March atDiavik, and a nutrition module will begin in May. Ideally, eachmodule would be allotted four months of focus. However, asthe program is in development, there will be some crossoverbetween modules.

Benoit pointed out that while WoW targeted the three dia-mond mining companies because of their male-dominatedworkforces with sizeable aboriginal populations, the program

May/Mai 2015 | 57

itself is not gender or culture specific. Thisis true for all participating sites.

A growing trendA 2008 survey of Canada’s top 100

employers (according to the annual compe-tition at canadastop100.com) revealed that90 per cent had an employee wellness pro-gram in 2006, up from 44 per cent in 1997.Of the companies reviewed, 95 per centagreed that the main motivation for imple-menting these programs was to increaseemployee satisfaction and engagement.Reducing disability and drug benefit costswere lower on companies’ list of prioritiesbut still important factors. The study alsoshowed that when companies tracked theresults of these programs, the investment

saved them money in the long run. Workplace wellness pro-grams in Canada most commonly take the form of EmployeeAssistance programs (short-term counselling services), healthseminars and fitness programs. Benefits Canada reported in2013 that Dupont, Citibank, Prudential Insurance and CanadaLife had a positive return on investment between $2 and $6.85for every $1 spent.

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Aboriginal males arethought to be among theleast likely to access the

health care system.

Tracking the resultsFrontline Medics is an occupational health serv-

ices provider for the mining, oil and gas, and con-struction industries that is involved withimplementing the WoW program at De Beers’ SnapLake mine. CEO and medical director Dr. KenJenkins observed that with so many minersapproaching middle age, companies are tuning intothe risks that poor lifestyle choices pose to the over-all functioning of operations.

“When you’re sick, you can’t do your job, so wemay have to send you off-site,” he said. “Whensomeone has a special skill that’s important to the functioningof the mine site, it can become a very big problem.”

To track WoW’s effectiveness, data collected from last sum-mer’s baseline surveys will be compared against informationthat will be obtained during interim and final evaluations,planned for the summers of 2015 and 2016, respectively. Eval-uations will consider participation, programs offered, and jobsatisfaction, as well as changes to policy, practice and environ-ment. The results of the pilot program will inform how WoWwill move forward.

“We know this is going to be a long-term project,” saidDebbie Corrigan, occupational health nurse at FrontlineMedics. “The hope is to embed [WoW] into the culture of the

mine site: not only do [mines] produce diamonds, but theirintent is to have the employee stay healthy – even leave theirjob healthier than when they started.”

The long-term goal of the WoW program is to reduce theincidence of chronic disease, and both Benoit and Kandolaacknowledge that this will be difficult to measure. It is alsohard to predict whether the WoW program will bring aboutthe social change that everyone involved has claimed it has thepotential for.

In spite of this uncertainty, Kandola has chosen to thinkbig: “We’re hoping that they go home and share it with fami-lies. We feel that workplace wellness should translate intohealthy families and healthy communities.” CIM


Exercise facilities at camp provide an opportunity to teach employees about healthy lifestyles.

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By the time he was approached by Kvaerner Cementa-tion U.K. in 1998 to run a new North American arm,Roy Slack had more than 15 years of industry experi-ence and some ideas of his own about how a mining

contracting company ought to be run. At the newly christenedCementation Canada, he had an opportunity to create a com-pany in that vision. First among his priorities was to eliminateworkplace injuries. Since inception, the company has achievedzero lost-time injuries on many major projects, such as theNickel Rim South mine twin shaft project for Xstrata and thePiccadilly project for PotashCorp. Along the way, CementationCanada has also become recognized both within the miningindustry and outside of it for its relentless focus on employeetraining.

Despite a full docket of work – 15 to 20 major projects atany given time, including marquee projects like the recent6,943-foot-deep shaft at Resolution in Arizona and theupcoming Goderich Twin Shafts project in Ontario, plus engi-neering studies and smaller projects – Cementation makessure that every one of its 1,100 Canadian and Americanemployees gets formal training each year.

What has driven Cementation to be an industry leader inthis area? And what lessons can other companies take fromSlack’s vision as president of the company?

CIM: What is your personal motivation to build the company inthis way, with this focus on safety and training, and what’s bestfor your employees? Slack: When I started out in 1982, the second shaft project Iwent to was a deep timber shaft. There were four fatalities onthat project. And, you know, I was new to the industry. Inschool, we didn’t talk much about safety, so it was a shock tome. And then you’d have some people saying, “Well, youknow, it’s going to happen,” almost accepting that every project

was going to have serious injuries. But I saw [those] things,and I was deeply impacted by them. The old-timers wereaccepting them, but the new people coming in were saying,“This isn’t right.”

You go through your career and there are different thingsthat hit home. There are many years where you’re not in aposition to change things, but once you are, once you get thechance, you say, “Let’s go for it. Let’s change some of thesethings.”

CIM: Cementation Canada has been named one of the FinancialPost’s Ten Best Companies to Work For (2012), winner ofCanadian Occupational Safety’s Canada’s Safest Employers GoldAward (2014), and one of Canada’s Top 100 Employers (2014,for the seventh time). How important is employee training tothose results? Slack: It’s absolutely critical. Part of our mission statement is tobe not only the contractor of choice, but the employer ofchoice in our industry as well. It’s so important to the successof our projects to have not just the right people, but with thetraining they need to be successful.

I look at those processes [participating in “Ten Best”-typecompetitions] as a tool. It’s almost like an audit. It takes youthrough your systems and how you’re doing on them. It alsointroduces you to what other companies are doing, to give yougood ideas on how to continually improve.

We have a really strong base in safety training – WorkplaceSafety North’s Common Core program and the Mining Indus-try Human Resources Council (MiHR) requirements – allthose training elements you need for our industry. But we’vealso developed, over the last number of years, the soft-skilltraining and professional development that really adds depthand opportunity for our people. The soft skills are very impor-tant for safety as well as productivity.

New schoolthinkingTraining is at the heart of Cementation’s award-winningemployee-first safetycultureBy Ian Ewing

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CIM: At a time when many employers – particularly in themining sector – find it difficult to justify spending on “extras”like employee training, how do you remain committed to thatvalue? Slack: If you’re committed to the value, then you’ll find waysto do it. When times are slow, we look at how we can con-serve, how we can get the most for our dollar, but it doesn’tchange our commitment to train and develop our people.

The vision, mission and values are my philosophy for thecompany. The basics of it are my own operating philosophy,but it’s certainly been fine-tuned by lots of people in the group.

CIM: How do you decide what training programs to undertakewithin the company?Slack: There are two different processes. The first is on ourprojects. When we start a project, we have a training matrixthat’s developed. [When you come onto a project], we evalu-ate what training you have now and what gaps you have inthe training. Then we establish a program so that within somany months, you will have the modules completed andhave the training done that you need to do the job we needyou to do. So that’s a very structured process. It’s not a simpleprocess, but it’s very easy to understand, and it’s all based onCommon Core and MiHR records or the legislated require-ments for whatever jurisdiction we work in.

The second part is for all staff. We do what we call a PAR(Professional Assessment Review). It establishes personalgoals for the year, based on departmental goals. Departmentalgoals are set through a cascading process from corporategoals, so there is alignment between corporate, departmentaland personal goals. Then we establish a personalized trainingprogram for the year, based on what you as an employeethink you should be trained on, and based on what yoursupervisor thinks you should be trained on. It’s very muchfocused on professional development. So every employee haskind of a wish-list of training.

The other element [of staff training] is our leadership devel-opment program, which identifies a number of people in thecompany who we feel are in developing leadership roles. It’s amuch more structured program. It’s supported by the HarvardManageMentor system, which is an e-learning tool that hasabout 40 modules. We’ve developed a lot of it internally [too],and we can distribute it to a number of employees at a reason-able cost per employee. It’s an excellent program.

CIM: You’ve obviously decided that training is a worthwhileinvestment. Do you have any empirical data that wouldindicate the value of your investment in training andeducation?Slack: [Laughs] No! That’s one of the things about training:there’s a little bit of faith involved. It’s very hard to put intonumbers that return on investment. How do you put numberson morale? How do you put numbers on retention? You don’tknow how many people would leave if you didn’t do thattraining. It’s really difficult [to quantify]. You have to be com-mitted to it for the right reasons.

We’re pretty diligent about what we spend on training, butthere are other numbers that are much more important to methan what we spend. When it comes to training, what’s impor-tant to me is making sure that we’re implementing our plans.When we say “every employee will have a training programwithin the company,” we evaluate and see the amount of train-ing each employee has done. And if we’re not meeting ourgoals, then that’s an issue. That’s a more important measure tome than what we spend.

CIM: Has the rigorous training resulted in any unexpectedbenefits?Slack: The New Miner Training program, which we originallystarted in Sudbury to introduce non-mining people to themining industry, has become a keystone of our partnershipwith the First Nations across Canada. It was never designedthat way to start with. But training is key to any First Nationspartnership. Our strong training programs have been verybeneficial to our partners in introducing their people to themining industry and getting them good jobs in the industry.And [it’s] not just for our company; once our work is done,they’re fully qualified to work for the owner’s team after wemove out and hand the mine over to the owners. It’s been areal success story and very important for our group and forour partners. CIM

May/Mai 2015 | 61

How companies are helpingemployees lead richer lives at campBy Katelyn SpidleIllustrations by Clare Mallison

It used to be that a job in mining often meantjoining communities and putting down roots in townscreated to serve a mine. But the last of those in Canada– Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia – was built more than30 years ago. According to research by Keith Storey atMemorial University of Newfoundland, the boom-bustnature of the minerals sector, the birth of telecommuting,a shortage of labour supply and the fact that resourcetowns offer limited opportunities, especially for women,have all contributed to wearing away the welcome ofpurpose-built mining towns. Camp life is here to stay.

The lesser-knownperks of remote work


May/Mai 2015 | 63

Long-distance commuting and camp life is the newmodel, with its own unique and sometimes difficult cir-cumstances. And while it is difficult to assess the grow-

ing number of workers facing these challenges, globally thereare now tens of thousands flying or driving to remote camps.In Western Australia, for example, the number of camp-basedmines grew to more than 100 in 2005 from about 26 in 1991.

Camp life means contending with social isolation, longhours and harsh weather, all the while trying to balance twolives: one at the mine, the other at home. Fly-in/fly-out (FIFO)workers make great pay and have access to modern facilities,but being separated from family and friends can leave an emo-tional gap that companies are increasingly trying to fill.

“There are things companies are doing that have animpact,” said Adrian Blanco, former procurement corporatemanager at Hochschild Mining (he is now with McEwen Min-ing). Until recently, he spent between 35 and 40 per cent ofhis time at Hochschild’s San José mine camp in Argentina.“When you have people involved in activities other than work,that provides a better environment for quality of life and alsoimproves safety standards and productivity.”

Camp life is unique in that for the weeks that an employeeis on site, the line between work and home is erased. JoanneKlein, Goldcorp’s vice-president of people, explained that thecompany strives to make sure employees do not feel they aremissing key parts of their home life. “I think it’s the smallthings, too,” she added. “When I was at Musselwhite recently,I walked into the cafeteria and there was a big whiteboardannouncing someone’s birthday. They had a big cake, and Ithink those are the things that go a long way to making peoplefeel at home.”

Blanco agreed that even small gestures greatly improveFIFO workers’ living conditions. When senior managementand board members visit operations in Argentina, for example,everyone eats together in the dining room so that everybodyfeels equal and valued. “People have break-fast, lunch and dinner at the same placefor weeks straight. It’s a time they sharewith everybody else; it’s a special timeof day,” he said.

Cross-culturalexchange

At the Raglan mine inNunavik, Quebec, FIFOworkers typically spendbetween two to threeweeks at a time on site, fol-lowed by two to threeweeks at home. The com-pany has several initiativesto help workers cope withthe alternative lifestyle.For example, in additionto offering each employeea gift on Christmas morn-

ing, the company hosts local Inuit artists for an art and craftsfair on International Aboriginal Day.

“The art and crafts fair allows us to promote the Inuit cul-ture,” said Céliane Dorval, communications and external rela-tions coordinator at Raglan, “and it’s a nice sharing[experience] between the Inuit employees and the non-Inuitemployees.” Raglan also has a leisure committee that regularlyorganizes game nights, BBQs, concerts, comedy shows andeven golfing down south for when FIFO workers are on theirtime off.

Sharing between the mining camp and local culture helpsFIFO workers cultivate a sense of pride, Blanco pointed out.One way that operations can encourage sharing is by havingworkers give tours of the mine and lead activities with localpeople. “This creates not only a sense of responsibility towardsthe community but also a sense of membership with the com-pany and pride for what the company is doing across thearea,” Blanco said.

Healthy body, healthy mineThe benefits of physical activity have been well researched

and documented. Staying physically fit decreases susceptibil-ity to illness and injury, and it also has a positive effect onmental health. To improve productivity and morale, compa-nies are increasingly outfitting mines with athletic facilitiesthat are freely accessible to employees.

“At Cigar Lake, Cameco’s recreation club tries to offer a vari-ety of physical and social activities for our employees and con-tractors to keep busy after work,” said Trevor Gonzales, HRgeneralist at Cameco. He described the mine’s full-size gym,where workers play floor hockey, soccer, badminton, volleyballand basketball. Employees can also join in a pumkin- carvingcontest around Halloween, watch ultimate fighting or boxingmatches on pay-per-view, or participate in sports competitions

between neighbouring mines. Goldcorp’s mines also have stand-out

fitness facilities, but Christine Marks, thecompany’s director of corporate commu-nications, said these take different formsdepending on the site. “At Peñasquito inMexico there’s a beautiful soccer pitch. Butthat doesn’t really make sense for northernQuebec in winter.” At Musselwhite, on thesouthern shore of Opapimiskan Lake,fishing equipment is very popular.

Fueling all that activity properly iscrucial. “The food is very, very impor-tant,” Klein said, adding that nutrition isalso site and culture specific. “We are for-tunate because the catering companythat we use at Musselwhite is a FirstNations company.” Windigo Catering,which serves the operation 480 kilome-

tres north of Thunder Bay, employs peoplefrom the area and incorporates traditional foods

like bannock and wild game into the menu.


May/Mai 2015 | 65

7 Disposable incomeis an illusion, bethrifty.

-zmobie632

indispensable

LIFE HACKS for remote worksites

4 Empty your fridge before you go andempty it well!

-the__funk

12Whether you are a wily vet or arookie hoping to appear lessso, these tips can help you

take control of your camp life.These suggestions originally

came from a discussion one ofour editors started on

reddit.com/r/mining, and areattributed by username. Somehave been edited for length,

grammar or punctuation.

2 Live with parents/ familyif you have a long FIFOstint. Why pay 100 percent of the rent whileyou’re only back home 20 per cent of the time?

-fermilevel

3 Candy’s good in general. A jumbo operator I worked withused to hide a bag of lollypops inthe cab which would mysteriouslyappear when the fitters showed up.His jumbo always worked fine. -Maldevinine

1 If your site haslockers, keep asmuch as you can in there. Nothaving to check a bag at the airport will saveyou a lot of hassle.-mol3cul3

5 Stock up on your tampons! Not only will you need them, but some day one ofyour (very few) female co-workers will need some.

-undertheaurora

8 Tupperware! If you wanta healthy lunch, bring afew tupperware and getyour name on it. Been toa lot of lunches with thelads and their food isalways squished up andwrecked from bouncingaround the back of theirMUTs/scoops.Meanwhile I’ve got abeautiful salad and mysandwich is pristine.

-undertheaurora

11 Stock up onsauces/dressingpackets from themess. You neverknow when they’llsuddenly disappearfor days/weeks at atime.

-mol3cul3

9 Befriend the IT guy, itmakes your workflow alot smoother.

-Kneep

10 Don’t be a dick.-Kneep

12 Internet at most mining camps isshoddy. Plan for not having it in theevenings (bring a USB with movies ora book or whatever).

-mol3cul3

6 Internet dating – Do the legwork when you’re on site, reap the benefits when home.

-zmobie632


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Striking a balanceAt Raglan, spouses are invited three times a year to visit the

site. “This is a great way to help spouses understand what theirhusband or wife does at the mine site and to see for them-selves what life is like there,” said Dorval. “Family plays a sig-nificant part in employee retention, so we have to engage withthem as well to ensure our workers’ well-being.”

But helping FIFO workers stay connected with family ona daily basis is one part of camp life that is proving difficultfor companies to improve.

The cost of Internet is very high, especially in remotelocations. While most mines have a wireless network con-nection, Blanco explained that the connection is often tooshoddy for video calling, which is very frustrating foremployees anxious to see the faces and hear the voices oftheir family back home.

While a reliable Internet connection is undoubtedlybecoming critical to the maintenance of modern life, Blancopointed out that providing a high-speed Wi-Fi connection atthe mine camps is a double-edged sword. Many employeescan become dependent on the Internet for entertainment andsocial connection, and spend all of their free time glued to aniPhone, tablet or laptop. This discourages workers fromengaging in exercise, participating in activities and integratingwith the FIFO community.

“It’s a whole new challenge for companies to win overemployees with attractive activities to promote teamwork,”Blanco said. At mines where he has worked, employees wereencouraged to participate because there were plenty of organ-ized inter-departmental sports competitions and tournaments.He said there is a noted increase in participation when com-panies provide game calendars, jerseys and prizes, and whenworkers are encouraged to develop creative team names. Suchthings provide identity, which helps form a sense of commu-nity – especially when the sport is culturally appropriate.

Providing a camp environment where FIFO workers canlead fulfilling lives sets the stage for more than just produc-tivity, safety and health; it opens the door to meaningful expe-riences, relationships and memories that can last a lifetime.

“I have seen many examples of friendships that growbeyond the mining site,” said Blanco. “This is a natural thing.Having these tough conditions can create a lot of bondsbetween people.” CIM

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nearby Mavres Petres silver-lead-zinc mine – part of the Stra-toni facility that also includes a processing plant and port –has been in near-continuous operation since the sixth century.And while miners have always made up a significant portionof the local population, Eldorado’s Greek projects nowemploy around 1,700 people in a municipality of about18,000. Unemployment in Greece currently hovers at around26 per cent. As much as it is a throwback to the old ways, thisproject is more about rebuilding Greece as a modern country.

M illennia-old mining artefacts dot the sides of the roadas we wind our way up the steep hills from the smallseaside town of Stratoni to Skouries, Greece’s newest

gold mine. “For us, this is going back to our roots,” saidMihalis Theodorakopoulos, managing director of HellasGold. He has been working on the Kassandra mines, whichincludes the Skouries, Olympias and Stratoni assets, for morethan 25 years, long before they were ever owned by a Cana-dian company (the first was TVX Gold in 1995). Eldorado’s

Eldorado’s Skouries project, set to enter production in 2017, could define a new erafor the Halkidiki Region in northern Greece. Along with the new open pit mine beingdeveloped, historic tailings are being reprocessed, industrial lands are beingreclaimed and Eldorado’s subsidiary, Hellas Gold, is intent on building a leading goldmining jurisdiction in the municipality of Aristotelis. But with Greece in political andeconomic turmoil, every small step forward is being carefully placed.

BY | PETER BRAUL

The Kassandra complex

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At Skouries, shown here, development work is underwayto prepare for both open-pit and underground mining.


project profile | K A S S A N D R A M I N E S

The main adit that will connect the Olympias mine to the Medem Lakkos ore body at the Stratoni operation

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A short lesson in modern Greek history

Productionstarted atOlympias Owner Hellenic

Fertilizer Company goesinto receivership

Greeceenters theEuropeanUnion

A conservativegovernmentreturns thecountry todemocracyafter sevenyears ofmilitary

dictatorshipsocialist governmentconservative governmentradical left government

1970 1974 1981 1991

nect them all in one place. The connecting link between allthese things is the metallurgical process.”

That connection is taking some time to build – aboutseven years from now is when Eldorado expects facilities tobe ready at Stratoni to treat ore and concentrate from theOlympias, Skouries and Stratoni operations.

Gold from the Olympias mine is refractory, so Eldorado isplanning to build a flash smelting plant at Stratoni that willtreat a mixture of copper and pyrite concentrates using tech-

Metallurgical master keyWith the entire Kassandra mines project approved under

one environmental impact assessment, Eldorado’s vision forthe area is long-term and broad in scope. Because it does notproduce gold, Stratoni might otherwise seem like an odd fitfor Eldorado, but the existing mine site is central to the waythe company is simultaneously developing its Olympias andSkouries assets. “The idea was to create one mining centre,”said Theodorakopoulos. “Instead of having three, let’s con-

May/Mai 2015 | 71

K A S S A N D R A M I N E S | project profile

Joel Rheault, general manager of the Olympias mine The Olympias flotation plant

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TVX Goldwins

auction forproperties

• Jan.: Kinross acquires TVX Gold and properties • June: Kinross’ Greek subsidiary startsbankruptcy proceedings

• Dec.: Greek state takes possession of propertiesfor €11M

• Dec.: Hellas Gold acquires properties fromGreek state for €11M

European Goldfieldsacquires Hellas Gold

Joint EIAapproval forall Kassandra

mines

Eldorado Goldacquires EuropeanGoldfields

Greece accepted into eurozone, begins using euros

Greece arranges secret €2.8Bcurrency swap with GoldmanSachs to hide government debt

from eurozone

tax evasion reaches 49%

Greek debt-to-GDPratio reaches 127%

Greece in recession

Bailoutof

€130B

1 1995 2000 2001 2003 2004 2005 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2015

• Greek government debt downgraded to junk bond status

• Bailout of €110B

process. For all of this to come together, an eight-kilometre-long ore transportation tunnel connecting the new plant withOlympias’ underground workings will need to be completed.

The two gold-bearing deposits are of very different geo-logical character. While Skouries is relatively high gradefor a porphyry ore body, with reserves at 0.76 grams pertonne of gold and 0.51 per cent copper, Olympias’ poly-metallic carbonate replacement ore body is much richer.

nology provided by Outotec. Flash smelting is a processdesigned to produce copper with gold as a byproduct, so nat-urally it requires copper in order to work. That copper willcome from the Skouries copper-gold porphyry deposit andits associated concentrator. Olympias ore will be refined toproduce lead/silver, zinc and gold concentrates. The goldconcentrates from Olympias and the copper concentratefrom Skouries will be combined in the flash smelting

Ore from Olympias will travel through an eight-kilometre tunnel to be processed at Stratoni.

continue, the company expects to turn a profit in Greece forthe first time. The mill and concentrator at Skouries are in con-struction now, though the government recently revoked per-mits for the plant’s completion, and pre-stripping is ongoingfor the open pit, with commercial production expected in2017. “In Skouries, 30 per cent of the gold is free, so with agravity circuit, this gold will be produced from the first day ofproduction,” said Theodorakopoulos. “The other 70 per centof the gold will report to the copper concentrate and for thefirst six to seven years it will be sold to external smelters.When we have our metallurgical plant [at Stratoni], up to 30per cent of the produced copper concentrate will be co-treatedwith the Olympias concentrate.”

Multi-taskingWhen I was on site last September, Greece’s head of oper-

ations for Eldorado, Britt Reid, and his operations team werealso there, taking a look at how progress was being made andchomping at the bit to take over from the construction team– though that would still be over a year away. Bulldozerswere moving earth to prepare the tailings management facil-ities, and a crew was installing drainage wells and injection

There, reserves are measured at 7.56 grams per tonne, with128 grams per tonne of silver, 5.7 per cent zinc and 4.3 percent lead – numbers that are counterbalanced by the diffi-culty in processing the refractory gold. The codependentrelationship of Skouries and Olympias makes both moreeconomic, but processing Olympias’ ore at Stratoni andaway from the town of Olympiada is also motivated byenvironmental concerns. The past-producing mine left alarge footprint, with old tailings taking up space. As themine’s old workings are being refurbished to support mod-ern operations, the tailings too are being treated andreclaimed. Remaining gold is being extracted, creatingbackfill for mined-out areas, and dewatered new tailingsare being moved to the active tailings facility at Stratoni. Itis likely the only chance the municipality has at having thehistoric Olympias site returned to something like its origi-nal state without footing the bill, and though Eldorado isnot making any money reprocessing tailings, it is at leastgaining social credit.

Eldorado’s shareholders want to see a return on their invest-ment, however, and the company is about to make a majortransition in terms of economics. Next year, should the project



OLYMPIAS • Products: lead/silver, zinc and gold concentrates

• Mining method: drift and fill

• Estimated mine life: 25 years

STRATONI• Products: lead-zinc-silver from Mavres Petres ore body

• Includes: tailings management facility,laboratory, concentrator, port

SKOURIES• Products: gold/copper concentrateand dore bars

• Mining method: open pit and sub-level open stoping

• Estimated mine life: 27 years

K A S S A N D R A M I N E S | project profile

Olympias processing plant manager Konstantinos Markogiannis (left)

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process tailings and even within that process to tweak it on amonthly basis. For example, slimes found in the old tailingsposed a dewatering challenge for disc filters. “If the concen-trate is below 20 grams per tonne the material is not saleableor the penalties are very high,” said Markogiannis.

Filter presses will figure into Markogiannis’ plans withrun-of-mine ore as well. Until the drilling contractor Aktorfinishes the tunnel to Stratoni, dewatered fine tailings will betrucked to the Stratoni tailings facility while coarse tailingswill be used as cemented backfill, so new filter presses willbe added to support the Olympias mill’s throughput of up to400,000 tonnes per year.

wells to divert groundwater from the ore body for the start ofproduction in the open pit. At the same time, developmentwas ongoing for the underground operations that will replaceproduction from the open pit about seven years after start-up. “We’ll get there,” Reid assured me.

Skouries will be the first open pit gold mine everattempted in Greece. The project has been designed to min-imize its footprint, limiting the total surface disturbance to180 hectares. SRK Consulting was brought on to determinethe optimum balance between open pit and undergroundmining. Theodorakopoulos explained that it would havebeen possible to keep the mine entirely underground, “butthat would have meant we couldn’t usethe open pit as a tailings disposal area,so we’d have to create another tailingsfacility and occupy about 700 hectares.”He added that open pitting the entiredeposit would have meant occupying1,600 hectares.

With all the preparation underway atSkouries, Olympias is equally underpressure to start mining next year. ThisNovember Konstantinos Markogiannis,the plant manager at Olympias, will startrefurbishing his equipment in order totreat feed from the mine once all of thehistoric tailings have been reprocessed.“We’ll stop for six months in order toinstall the new equipment and modifythe plant,” he said, estimating that it willbe ready for production next May. Histeam is accustomed to change by now,having had to refit the plant first to The mill at Skouries, shown under construction last December, is slated to be commissioned in 2016.

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not without its challenges. “Changing hearts and minds takestime, patience and a lot of dialogue,” says Eduardo Moura,Eldorado’s vice-president and general manager of Greece. Tofamiliarize local residents with its operations and environ-mental commitments, the gold miner has welcomed morethan 4,000 people to its Halkidiki sites in the last year alone.Students come by the busload, and the company’s PR man-ager, Kostas Georgantzis, told me they are seeing majorimprovement in public sentiment, but the company faces aconstant uphill struggle.

At the moment, a lot of the tension surrounding Eldo-rado’s operations seems to be coming from the chaos ofAthens, rather than the local parties. Political divisions in thecountry are now contested with a fiery and even violent pas-sion that is difficult to reconcile with Greece’s reputation asthe birthplace of democracy.

In the municipality of Aristotelis, however, there is hopethat things can settle down as the benefits of Eldorado’s proj-ects continue making their mark on the surrounding com-munities. “We have a new mayor whose main election sloganwas ‘Let’s reunite the area,’” Theodorakopoulos said, addingthat groups that had traditionally been anti-mining have got-ten behind this new leader and may be more open to seeingwhat the company’s operations are really like. It is perhaps inthis small way that a country gets rebuilt. CIM

Joel Rheault, general manager of the Olympias mine, isoverseeing the development of untapped resources atOlympias and the widening and heightening of old drifts thatcan still be of use. A native of Atikokan, Ontario, Rheaultmoved with his wife and three daughters to nearby Thessa-loniki. He is not likely to run out of work. “There’s a lot left,”he said, examining the mine plan with glee. Previous miningonly reached the upper half of one ore body, and left a seconddeposit a few hundred metres to the east untouched. Rheaultsaid he and his team hope to be there soon enough: “The eastramp will open up multiple work headings to us to start driv-ing towards the [east] ore body.”

Greek political theatreWith so much work ongoing at Eldorado’s operations, it is

hard to come to terms with the sabre-rattling of the Greekgovernment (see “Greece adds hurdle for Eldorado’s Skouriesproject,” p. 32). According to Eldorado, the mines will offermore than 5,000 direct and indirect jobs once they are in fullproduction at a time of painful economic realities in Greece.

Eldorado has worked to build relationships and show aGreek sense of hospitality. The local culture is one in whichcoffee breaks stretch to accommodate social requirements,and no meal is complete without company. But pioneeringmodern mining techniques in a tourism-oriented economy is



Work currently underway includes tailings rehabilitation at the Olympias mine.

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CLEVER RESOURCEFUL SOLUTIONSAt Orica, we’re focused on developing long term partnerships which reduce total cost of mining and improve productivity, while enhancing your license to operate.

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May/Mai 2015 | 77

Battery-powered machines, unlike their power-cord-tethered or trolley-connectedcousins, have unlimited range of motion, the freedom to work in development areaswithout outlets, and few exposed fragile parts. Finding the right battery has been

challenging enough to limit the use of this technology to specific, light-use vehicles. But twomanufacturers, General Electric (GE) and RDH, have pushed battery power into a new, moreintensive, application: load-haul-dump vehicles.

From scoops to LHDsThe closest relative of the battery-powered LHD would be the scoop, which is the norm

for utility applications in underground coal mines, where regulations designed to preventmethane fires have discouraged diesel use. Typical scoops have a flat profile suited for lowcoal seams.

Charged upBy Eavan Moore

Electric mining vehicles are cleaner, cooler and quieter alternatives to diesel. As companies continuously look to cut costs and improve working conditions,battery-powered load-haul-dump (LHD) units are being deployed to take on moreof the underground mining workload.

The weight provided by abattery enhances the tractionof an LHD when the bucketengages a muck pile.

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technologyUNDERGROUND EQU I PMEN T


“Scoops, as utility machines, operate intermittently,”explained Mark Sprouls, spokesperson for Caterpillar, one ofseveral manufacturers of battery-powered scoops. “Batterypower is quite efficient in such applications, as there is noneed to allow an engine to come up to operating temperatureor to cool down before turning off.”

According to Sprouls, a typical coal mine has a scoop foreach continuous mining section. The scoop will have fourlead-acid batteries in circulation: two in the vehicle and twocharging. At every shift change, the scoops pull up to acharging station near the operating area, where a hoist or aspecialized transfer system is used to swap out the depletedbatteries.

These batteries are extremely heavy – in the several-tonrange – and large. That is why their use is limited to lessdemanding utility applications. But battery technologieshave improved in recent years. When GE acquired theunderground equipment manufacturer Fairchild in 2012, itimmediately set about adapting the frame of a Fairchild bat-tery-powered coal scoop for use as a hard-rock productionLHD. Concurrently, RDH Mining Equipment developed itsown battery-powered LHD.

LHDs are a different animal from scoop trams. Designedto lift and drop loads into trucks and hoppers, they have thehigher, narrower profiles suited to the geometry of a hard

rock mine and they come in a wider range of sizes to meetmore varied needs. At their largest, LHDs can get over 20tonnes of tramming capacity; at their smallest, they carryunder two tonnes.

Building better batteriesGE decided to use 240-volt lead-acid batteries in its first

models, providing customers with a familiar technology fromother mining applications. Lead-acid is also a more econom-ical battery solution than lithium-ion, which costs three tofour times more per kilowatt hour, according to SidGaitonde, senior product manager of underground propul-sion at GE Mining.

Although batteries of any type are heavy – adding asmuch as 20 per cent to the LHD weight – that can actuallybe an asset for machines during mucking operation, saidGaitonde. He explained that they get more traction whenthe bucket engages the muck pile. The operator does nothave to let the wheels slip to ensure the bucket is com-pletely filled. GE’s choice to power the wheels andhydraulic functions with separate AC motors providesextra efficiency, added Gaitonde. Having a dedicatedmotor gives the machine more traction on inclines, andthe operator has better control during the different modesof operation.

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May/Mai 2015 | 79

Further, the more power that can be packed into thatadded weight, the better. Competitor RDH decided to buildits prototypes with 470-volt lithium iron phosphate batterycells from the outset. Among their numerous advantages overlead-acid, lithium batteries weigh about half as much for thesame power. They also live longer; whereas lead batteries lastabout 1,500 cycles before they need to be discarded, lithiumcan get up to 5,000.

Gustavo Portalier, COO at RDH, said it took about a yearof testing batteries to come up with cells that provided suffi-cient power and that did not overheat. “This is a big learningcurve with batteries,” said Portalier. “It’s why not many com-panies do it.”

Kirkland Lake GoldRDH won its first customer through field tests at the

Macassa mine in Ontario, where a deepening mine plan ledowner Kirkland Lake Gold to find ways of reducing ventila-tion needs. The first battery-powered LHD went under-ground in 2012, followed by three 18-tonne trucks the yearafter. Batteries are now powering 12 LHDs at Macassa, eachwith buckets that hold about 2.3 cubic metres.

The mine keeps three batteries available for each vehicleat any given time: two on board – one in use and one spare– while a third is charging. A single battery can operate themachine for up to four hours, and each takes up to an hourand a half to recharge. When one of the vehicle’s batteriesruns low, it stops by a battery station and an overhead craneswitches it out for a spare. When the spent battery has fin-ished recharging, the vehicle comes back and gets anotherswitch-out. It is also possible to replace all the batteries atonce – but that requires about 1.5 hours of downtime forthe LHD.

Making sure the batteries stay charged and fully opera-tional is something that Kirkland Lake has been learning to

do over time. “Werecently set up a mainte-nance crew dedicatedfirst and foremost to thebatteries and theirrespective infrastructure,” said CEO George Ogilvie. “Keep-ing that equipment and infrastructure running efficiently isessential to our production.”

IamgoldGE tested its own prototype at Iamgold’s Westwood mine

in Quebec. “Westwood was very helpful, very eager to try it,”said Rémi Desrosiers, an application engineer at GE Mining.

In continuous operation, one lead-acid battery suppliessix to eight hours of power while one or two additional bat-teries charge. At the end of each shift, the battery can bechanged in 10 to 15 minutes using a proprietary swap-outsystem that does not require a crane or other permanentinfrastructure. “The lead-acid takes about eight hours tocharge, so if you want a battery available at all times, we rec-ommend three batteries,” said Gaitonde. When GE fulfills itsplans to introduce a lithium – or a similarly efficient – bat-tery, customers who take that option would use two batteriesper vehicle.

Cost and benefitsAny prospective customer will ask how much, exactly,

batteries cost. Portalier said RDH’s LHD is 30 per cent morecostly than a diesel model, but the reduction in diesel con-sumption and ventilation required to clear exhaust from thework area gives batteries a short payback. A complete batterycharge for the 2.3-cubic metre LHD – providing three to fourhours of work – is about 120 kW, according to Portalier, whosays a diesel LHD of the same size would consume 12 to 16litres of fuel an hour.

technologyUNDERGROUND EQU I PMEN T

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The Caterpillar SU488 battery-poweredscoop (above) is ideal for low coal

seams because of its flat profile andhigh heat efficiency.


Kirkland Lakeintroduced the battery-poweredLHDs when oil was more than $120 a barrel. Given a strongdifferential between the cost of diesel and the cost of electric-ity, the new equipment paid for itself within a year. With oilon its more recent downswing, said Ogilvie, Kirkland Lake isstill saving money, but the greatest benefits are in ventilation.“Most importantly, our workforce in these areas is working incleaner air,” he pointed out.

Desrosiers said the main focus of GE’s marketing was toaddress the problem of diesel particulate matter, which theWorld Health Organization deemed carcinogenic in 2012.But what he has discovered is that some customers are moreinterested in the heat-reduction aspects of battery-powered vehicles. “Electric machines have much, much higher [heat]efficiency than a diesel counterpart,” he said. “For manycustomers, the heat management is sometimes more impor-

tant than the diesel particulatematter (DPM) concentration.Whether the need is to reduceDPM or heat, we can help reducethe ventilation cost.”

Learning how to use itSeasoned operators can make the switch to electric easily,

according to GE’s Desrosiers. “There was one operator whoactually got the hang of the vehicle controls within 45 min-utes,” he said. The machine is simpler in some ways. Forexample, there is no starter for the engine.

There is also less operator involvement in braking. “Nor-mally, the operator would use the brakes quite a bit if he hadto go down a hill,” explained Desrosiers. “In our case, the

Courtesy of RDH Mining Equipment

Kirkland Lake Gold hasbeen using RDH Mining

Equipment’s battery-powered Muckmaster

300EB LHD at its Macassamine since 2012.


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brake usage is reduced because as you’re going down, thesystem automatically engages the motors to slow the unit andtransfers that energy to the batteries. Effectively, they’rerecharging the batteries when going down the slope, and thisis transparent to the operator.”

Equally, operators will not have much to relearn on RDHmachines, said Portalier. While they could theoretically letthe battery run down unintentionally, the machines have awarning system. At 20 per cent battery life, a yellow lightcomes on and the machine shuts down long enough to alertthe operator that it is time to get to a charging station. GE hasa similar system on its LHDs.

Remote battery monitoring, maintenance and trou-bleshooting can be done by the mine, with support frommanufacturers if needed. RDH machines can connect to awireless network for remote assistance; GE provides over-the-phone or in-person support.

The most striking difference equipment operators willfind is the relative quiet of the battery-powered units. Theroar of diesel LHDs can put out a lot of decibels, sometimesrequiring operators to wear double hearing protection. Thebattery-powered models only produce around 50 to 60 deci-bels – so little that both RDH and GE customers haverequested an audible warning to alert workers in the vicinitywhen the machines move.

Orders and expansions on the wayFollowing successful trials, GE and RDH have orders in

place for their respective LHDs. The GE commercial modelto be launched at the end of 2015 has been dubbed the LHD-7-HB, indicating its seven-ton hauling capacity. Thebucket is four cubic yards (three cubic metres).

GE is also planning to expand its battery choices in 2016.Gaitonde said the company is evaluating lithium againstother materials, including GE’s own Durathon sodium nickelbatteries.

RDH sells its machine under the name Muckmaster300EB. Portalier said the company will have a two-cubicyard (1.5-cubic metre) machine ready by the end of July inaddition to the three-cubic yard to 3.5-cubic yard (2.3 to2.67-cubic metre) and six-cubic yard (4.6-cubic metre) mod-els it has already sold to miners. The company is also work-ing on a more powerful lithium phosphate battery thatwould operate for six hours.

Those plans could go some way to address the desires ofthe current user. Asked what improvements he would liketo see in the technology, Ogilvie answered: “We’d like tosee longer life in the batteries before a change out isrequired. In addition, we’d like to see individual cells lastlonger before having to be discarded or refurbished.”Macassa’s first cells are expected to reach the end of theiruseable life shortly.

The Macassa mine could also use smaller equipment,having recently prioritized grade over tonnage and nar-rowed the scope of its mining activities. Ogilvie said thecurrent LHDs require a minimum 2.1-metre miningwidth; there are areas where a 1.5-metre width would bepreferred.

With battery-powered trucks and LHDs already in opera-tion at one mine, more orders on the way, and plans forexpansion, these manufacturers have broken a path for therest of the industry. When it comes to scaling up, said Portal-ier, “There’s no limit. Everything depends on the batterytechnology you’re using.” CIM

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CIM’s Maintenance, Engineering and Reliability (MER)Society unveiled its annual scholarship winners for the2014–15 academic year, collectively valued at nearly$10,000. MER offers scholarships to students entering orcurrently attending post-secondary institutions, each of

which can be awarded several times depending on the qual-ity of the applicants.

All scholarships are open to CIM members and their imme-diate family. Next year’s scholarship applications are due by theend of September.

Ken Hildebrant Memorial Scholarship The Ken Hildebrant Memorial Scholarship, created in 2006 in memory of the former MER Society chairman, is open to studentsentering or currently enrolled in a post-secondary institution. The scholarship is valued at $2,000 and was awarded to three applicantsthis year.

MER announces annual scholarship recipientsBy Chris Balcom

scholarships

Liana Hadjigeorgiou is a first-yearstudent at Queen’s University, where shereceived an Excellence Scholarship toenroll in the bachelor of commerceprogram. Hadjigeorgiou is a member ofthe Queen’s Consulting Association.

Nicolas Smit is a graduate of LaurentianUniversity and the mining engineeringtechnician program at Sudbury’sCambrian College. He is currently enrolledin the college’s mining engineeringtechnology program and will begraduating this spring. Smit is the socialchair of CIM’s Sudbury Branch andpreviously sat on the board as the studentrepresentative.

Nathaniel Smith is in his second year ofstudies at the University of BritishColumbia’s Norman B. Keevil Institute ofMining, where he is enrolled in theundergraduate mining and mineralprocessing engineering program. He iscurrently the second-year representativeof the Mining Undergraduate Society and aparticipant on the university’s CanadianMining Games team.

Catherine Lamontagne willsoon be concluding the third andfinal year of her undergraduatestudies at Université Laval inQuebec City, where she has beenstudying mechanicalengineering.

Centennial ScholarshipThe Centennial Scholarship, established in 1998 to mark the 100th anniversary of CIM, is awarded to current students studying MERdisciplines with plans to enter the mining industry after graduating. The scholarship is valued at $1,998.

Cooper Meadows is in the finalyear of his undergraduatestudies at the University ofSaskatchewan. He will begraduating this spring with adegree in chemical engineering.Meadows is very active in theCIM Saskatoon Student Chapter,the National MiningCompetition, and the newlyformed CIM MetSoc StudentChapter at the University ofSaskatchewan.

held inconjunction with

{AUGUST } 23-26

THE HEART OF THE METALS & MATERIALS COMMUNITYWelcome to the 54th annual Conference of Metallurgists (COM) and America’s Conference on Aluminum Alloys (AMCAA)to be held at the Fairmont Royal York in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on August 23-26, 2015. MetSoc is delighted to co-hostthe first AMCAA with a focus on the aluminum alloys used in transportation. Issues around sustainability of both metalsand materials manufacturing and use are woven into the conference technical symposia.

COM's program includes three honorary symposia dedicated to people who have made substantial contributions to our field;a poster session; a riveting plenary; and an expanded tradeshow. A unique aspect of this conference is a special symposiumheld to honour women who have made significant contributions to the Canadian metallurgical, materials and mining industry.

The International Conference on Aluminum Alloys (ICAA) has traditionally been the premier global conference for exchangingemerging knowledge on the processing, structure and properties of aluminum materials. The first America’s regional meetingof ICAA will be held in conjunction with COM in Toronto, Canada in 2015 and will act as a building block for Canada tohost the ICAA18 meeting in Quebec in 2018. Don’t miss it!

Participate in what will be an excellent opportunity to share knowledge and experiences, meet old friends and make newones, and honor and celebrate those in our industry.

Mary Wells, COM 2015 Chair and Incoming President Kaan Inal, AMCAA 2015 ChairUniversity of Waterloo University of Waterloo

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Help us deliver quality programming and get some visibility! Contact [email protected]

COM 2015» Advanced Aerospace Materials» Advances in Materials Manufacturing II» Computational Materials Science » David S. Wilkinson Honorary Symposium » Sustainable Hydrometallurgical Processes & Technologies, Lucy Rosato Memorial Symposium » Management of Metallurgical Plant Capital Projects DAY REGISTRATION AVAILABLE FOR THIS SESSION!

» Managing Furnace Integrity for Reliable Metal Production » Materials Challenges » Sustainability in Ironmaking/Steelmaking » Torstein Utigard Memorial Symposium » UBC-McGill-UoA Symposium on Mineral Processing:

Modelling & Optimization of Mineral Processing Systems » WALSIM: Water, Air and Land; Sustainability Issues in Mineral and Metal Extraction

GREAT MINDS SPEAK

5 4 t h A N N U A L C O N F E R E N C E O F M E TA L L U R G I S T S

SUSTAINABILITY IN METALS ANDMATERIALS PROCESSING AND USE

AMCAA: American’s Conference of Al Alloys» Mechanical Properties, Phase Transformations and Characterization» Manufacturing Processes» Formability and Fracture» Modelling and Simulation» Aluminum Supply and Recycling» Joining» Surfaces and Corrosion

CHECK OUT THE SPEAKERS’ LIST ONLINE: web.cim.org/COM2015

SPECIAL INVITED TALKS

PLENARY

Maurits van CampDirector of Recycling & Extraction Platform, Umicore

“ Towards a Resource Resilient Society via the Triple HelixConcept”

Donald SadowayJohn F. Elliot Professorof Materials Chemistry, MIT

Stephen CarlislePresident of General Motors of Canada Ltd.

DAY REGISTRATION AVAILABLE FOR THIS SESSION!

Women of Impact Celebrate and hear from some of the women who have made a significant impact on our industry.

SPEAKERS INCLUDE:

Annette Bergeron, Management ConsultantLiana Centomo, CEZincEva Carissimi, CEZincLouise Grondin, Agnico-Eagle MinesCarolyn Hansson, University of WaterlooJennifer Jackman, CANMETMaterialsSusan Knoerr, Teck Resources LimitedIndira Samarasekera, University of AlbertaPriti Wanjara, NRC CanadaJanice Zinck, CanmetMINING

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GREAT MINDS LEARNShort CoursesYou are not required to be a conferencedelegate to register for the courses. All courses take place on August 22-23prior to the start of the conference.

1. Fundamentals and Applications of SustainableHydrometallurgical ProcessingTechniques Concepts (11⁄2 days)

2. Improvement Through ConstraintsModelling (1 day)

3. Liquid Metals and Molten Salts (2 days)

4. Sheet Materials and Processing forTransportation Lightweighting (1 day)

5. Welding of Aluminum Alloys (1 day)

6. Refractory Systems Optimization andWhy Furnaces Fail and What you CanDo About it (1 day)

Industrial TourThe Sustainable Hydrometallurgical Processing tour is organized on Thursday,August 27, with visits to SGS Canada Incand Eco-Tec Inc.

Only 25 spaces are available so act fast!

GREAT MINDS PARTICIPATEExhibit at COM 2015 and get the best of both worlds!Included with each 10x10 booth space, exhibiting companies now have two full delegatepasses, a value of $1,700. Exhibitors can take advantage of showcasing their companywhile discovering recent trends and innovative research at the technical sessions.

Monday Poster and Trade Show session dedicated for you.

Trade show exhibitors include: Activation Laboratories Ltd. • Ashland Inc. • AuTec Innovative Extractive Solutions Ltd. • Blasch Precision Ceramics • GEA Westfalia Separator • IC Controls • Intlvac •Keyence Canada Inc. • Olympus Canada Inc. • RPS Composites • Scantech Pty Ltd.• SGS Canada Inc • Watson Valve Services Inc.

WHY WAIT? REGISTER NOWRegistration for COM-AMCAA, is now open. Pay one price and experience it all!

GREAT MINDS INSPIREStudents, your career starts here! » Student-Industry Mixer: Start building your network of contacts at the Student-In-

dustry Mixer - and don't forget to bring your resumé!

» Poster Competition: Present your poster to peers and industry professionals. A cashprize is available.

» MetSoc Students Financial Assistance: Financial assistance is available to supportstudent travel to the conference. Students may also partially defray expenses by servingas session monitors. Contact Brigitte Farah at [email protected] for further details.

GREAT MINDS NETWORK

GREAT MINDS VOTENotice to members | Avis de convocation

The Annual General Meeting of the membersof the Metallurgy and Materials Society ofCIM will be held in Toronto on Monday, August24, at 8 a.m. at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel.

L’Assemblée générale annuelle des membresde MetSoc de l’ICM et du pétrole aura lieuà Toronto, le lundi 24 août à 8 h à l’hôtelFairmont Royal York.

Social ProgramWe’re more than just a technical conference

SUNDAY AUGUST 23

Opening ReceptionAll delegates are invited to attend the Welcome Reception Sundayevening, taking place in the Metals 2015 Trade Show. Come andenjoy a complimentary drink and hors d’oeuvres.

MONDAY AUGUST 24

Torstein Utigard Memorial NightJoin us for an informal fun night that includes cocktails and fingerfoods. This will be a great opportunity for people to raise a glassto the late professor Utigard, share some personal moments withothers and connect with people who have been touched by him.Donations will be made to the Palliative Care Unit from CreditValley Hospital.

TUESDAY AUGUST 25

Hydrometallurgy Section LuncheonThe Hydrometallurgy section of MetSoc of CIM is inviting delegatesto attend the annual section luncheon where invited speaker Dr. Fathi Habashi, Professor Emeritus of Extractive Metallurgy ofUniversité Laval, will be featured. The section activities and awardswill also be presented.

Awards Banquet & ReceptionThe MetSoc-AMCAA conference banquet will be held on Tuesday. At this event, the Metallurgy and Materials Society of CIM willhonour its outstanding members by presenting the MetSoc Awards.

WEDNESDAY AUGUST 26

Historical Metallurgy LunchThe Historical Metallurgy Committee of MetSoc will host a box lunchon Wednesday, featuring guest speaker Phil Haynes. He will present“Developments in Ni HPAL: From Moa Bay to Today.”

Women of Impact luncheonJoin us for the Women of Impact symposium luncheon! Dr. IndiraSamarasekera, President of the University of Alberta, will be ourguest speaker.

Explore new ideas with us at stantec.com/mining

Design with community in mind

Looking beyond the surface. Analyzing every detail of your project. Uncovering hidden opportunities. All of this is at the core of everything we do. From mine design to sha�s and hoisting systems, material handling systems and mine infrastructure, we bring 30 years of design experience, practical application, and innovation to each and every project.

Deep Thinking

Visit us at the CIM Convention 2015 Booth #2324

May/Mai 2015 | 93

SECTIONfrancophone

La version française intégraledu CIM Magazine estdisponible en ligne :

magazine.CIM.org/fr-CA

article de fond104 S’adapter à la vie au campement

Des conseils, des outils et destechniques pour créer l’environnementde travail moderne qui vous convientdans un lieu isoléPar Katelyn Spidle

95 Lettre de l’éditeur

95 Mot du président

96 Les actualités en bref

108 Le complexe de KassandraLes mines grecques d’Eldorado sontchargées d’histoire, mais leur avenirest incertainPar Peter Braul

113 Résumés techniques

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lettre de l’éditeur mot du president

Àl'automne dernier,notre chef de rubriquePeter Braul et notre

coordinatrice des communica-tions Zoë Koulouris se sontenvolés pour Thessalonique, enGrèce, en mettant dans leursvalises un appareil photo, unenregistreur vocal et un tubede crème solaire. Destinationles mines de Kassandrad'Eldorado Gold, situées dans lapéninsule de Chalcidique. Ces

sites, exploités par Hellas Gold, la filiale grecque d'Eldorado, sontun ensemble d'anciens terrains industriels et vierges dont cer-tains produisent sporadiquement des métaux depuis des mil-liers d'années.

Avant que ces sites ne soient transformés en exploitationsrentables, la société Eldorado a cependant encore beaucoup àfaire : elle devra terminer la construction d'un tunnel de huitkilomètres reliant deux des mines et permettant de transporterle minerai ; retraiter les résidus issus de l'ancienne production ;réaménager et élargir les anciens chantiers souterrains ;développer une mine à ciel ouvert (la première dans le pays) etconstruire une usine de traitement qui pourra gérer l'alimenta-tion des trois mines construites. Vous trouverez dans notrerubrique Profil de projet des explications détaillées de Peterdans l'article intitulé « Le complexe de Kassandra » (p. 109), dontle titre fait allusion au mythe grec de la belle Cassandre, laquellereçut le don de prophétie mais dont les prédictions d'avenir nefurent jamais prises au sérieux.

Ce projet, qui emploie actuellement plus de 2 000 person-nes, semble être une belle occasion pour la Grèce qui se trouvedepuis quelques temps dans une situation économique plusque déplorable. La politique pratiquée dans le pays a cependantmis en péril l'avenir de ces mines. Les partisans argumenterontdu rôle important que ce projet (dont deux des trois mines ontune durée de vie d'au moins 25 ans) pourrait jouer pourarracher le pays du marasme économique dans lequel il setrouve. S'il est arrêté, les investisseurs étrangers se contenterontde récupérer leurs fonds si précieux et d'aller les placer ailleurs.Les opposants, quant à eux, prétendent que les coûts environ-nementaux seront trop lourds et le gouvernement récemmentélu les soutient. Ainsi, nous attendons pour l'heure de voirquelles mises en garde seront prises en compte ou rejetées.

Ryan Bergen, Rédacteur en [email protected]

@Ryan_CIM_Mag

Les membres de l’ICM sontconnus dans le monde entierpour leurs compétences

techniques et leur approche éthiquede l’exploitation des minéraux. Ilnous incombe de partager cetteapproche fondée sur les pratiquesexemplaires avec tous les pays et del’appliquer à tous les projets aux-quels nous participons.

Le développement responsabledes ressources minérales peutapporter des améliorations immé-diates et durables à la qualité de vie de nombreux pays et régions moinsdéveloppés. Dans cette optique, l’ICM, à titre de principal institut de tech-nologie au service de l’industrie des minéraux canadienne, a un rôle clé àjouer afin de promouvoir les pratiques exemplaires dans l’industrie desminéraux mondiale.

D’autres instituts techniques de l’industrie des minéraux, notammentl’Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, la Society for Mining,Metallurgy & Exploration aux États-Unis et le Southern African Institute ofMining and Metallurgy partagent cet engagement dans les pratiquesexemplaires.

Dans le cadre de la Global Minerals Professionals Alliance (GMPA), l’ICMtravaille avec ces instituts afin « d’encourager les relations mutuellementbénéfiques qui faciliteront le partage de connaissances et de technologiesqui renforceront l’excellence technique et professionnelle dans l’industriedes minéraux, d’offrir des programmes de formation et de perfectionne-ment professionnel et de faciliter les occasions de partage des connais-sances. » Par ailleurs, tous ces instituts accorderont un statut de « membrevisiteur » pendant 12 mois aux membres qui résident ou travaillent dans larégion d’un institut hôte.

Comme ceci est mon dernier message du président, j’aimerais profiterde cette occasion pour vous dire que cette année a été particulièrementenrichissante et satisfaisante. Ce fut pour moi un grand honneur d’assumerles fonctions de président et de travailler en collaboration avec lesmembres du personnel très efficaces de notre bureau national, ainsiqu’avec une équipe dévouée de bénévoles auprès du conseil, de l’institutet des sections. J’aimerais remercier chacun d’entre vous pour votre sou-tien, votre engagement et votre excellent travail!

Ce mois-ci, Garth Kirkham va assumer le rôle de président de l’ICM. M. Kirkham est un passionné et un grand connaisseur de notre industrie, etje me réjouis de travailler avec lui au cours de l’année.

Sean WallerPrésident de l’ICM

Voyage en terres hellènes Le rôle essentiel du Canada surla scène mondiale

May/Mai 2015 | 95

Les actualités en bref


conseil d’administration ont été nom-més en mars, dont Hélène Lauzon, pré-sidente du Conseil patronal del’environnement du Québec (CPEQ),une organisation à but non lucratif quirassemble plusieurs industries se préoc-cupant de leur impact sur l’environne-ment. « Notre mandat consistera àmettre en œuvre la stratégie gouverne-mentale sur le Plan Nord », indiquait-elle. « Il est de notre responsabilitéd’optimiser les retombées économiqueset de conseiller le gouvernement quantau développement du Nord. Nousallons organiser de nombreusesréunions dans les mois à venir pourmettre en place l’intégralité de la struc-ture, ses règlements et son budget. » La société est officiellement sur pied

depuis le 1er avril. Le 6 mars, le ministredélégué aux mines Luc Blanchette estrevenu d’une visite d’une semaine en Abi-tibi, dans la Côte-Nord et le Nord-du-Québec, où il a mené des consultationsauprès des parties concernées, à savoir lessociétés minières et les fournisseurs ; lesmunicipalités et les communautés affec-tées ; les centres de recherche et dévelop-pement (R&D) et les groupesenvironnementaux. M. Blanchette a mul-

tiplié ces rencontres depuisseptembre afin de définir unevision stratégique du dévelop-pement minier, l’élément central de la stratégie du Plan Nord.Le gouvernement a

annoncé le 8 avril son PlanNord à l’horizon 2035, pland’action 2015-2020, quiinclut des investissements deprès de 2,7 milliards $ dansdes projets d’infrastructuresd’ici 2035. Hydro-Québecinvestira 10 millions $annuellement. Parmi les objectifs prévus

par le plan, le gouvernement s’efforcerade développer de façon responsable lesressources naturelles du Nord, dediversifier le secteur des ressourcesminérales et d’accroître les capacités detraitement des minerais de la province.

Mine Arnaud et le dilemme de la Côte-Nord Parmi les initiatives du gouverne-

ment visant à diversifier la productionminérale du Québec, le projet de mined’apatite riche en phosphate de MineArnaud est considéré, du moins par lesecteur des affaires et les syndicats,comme l’un des plus importants pourl’industrie minière de la Côte-Nord (unerégion dominée depuis longtemps par laproduction de minerai de fer). Détenu à62 % par Investissement Québec, unesociété de financement du Québec, et à38 % par Yara International, l’un desplus gros producteurs d’engrais aumonde, ce projet peine depuis desannées à obtenir son permis social d’ex-ploitation à Sept-Îles, en raison desinquiétudes que suscitent ses impactsenvironnementaux sur la population.En février, le Bureau d’audiences

publiques sur l’environnement (BAPE)

Dans son classement annuel surl’industrie minière publié enfévrier, l’Institut Fraser a ramené leQuébec au 6e rang des 10 juridic-tions les plus attrayantes aumonde. La province occupait lapremière position de 2007 à 2010,avant de dégringoler au 18e rangen 2013.Quelques jours plus tard pour-

tant, les statistiques provisoirespubliées par l’Institut de la statis-tique du Québec affichaient untableau bien différent. Les investis-sements miniers au Québec ontdécliné de près d’un tiers en 2014pour atteindre 3,2 milliards $, lerésultat le plus mauvais en cinq ans.L’an dernier, le gouvernement libéral

a ressuscité le Plan Nord, une stratégiede développement économique ambi-tieuse, bien que nébuleuse, misantpresque exclusivement sur les ressourcesnaturelles du vaste territoire québécoissitué au nord du 49e parallèle. Il s’estdepuis activé sur plusieurs fronts afin deconvaincre les investisseurs que le Qué-bec jouira d’une position enviablelorsque les prix remonteront. La pre-mière version du Plan Nord, présentéepar le gouvernement libéral en 2011,avait été balayée par une défaite électo-rale et un effondrement du cours desmatières premières.L’étude de faisabilité relative à la

construction d’une troisième ligne fer-roviaire entre la fosse du Labrador et leport de Sept-Îles a été confiée enoctobre à la société montréalaise Cana-rail, en grande partie grâce à l’activismede Champion Iron et d’AdrianaResources, sans oublier l’enveloppebudgétaire de 20 millions $ accordéepar le Québec.Puis, en décembre, le projet de loi

70 a donné naissance à la Société duPlan Nord. Neuf des 15 membres du

En mars, le ministère de l’environnement du Québec a accordé un permisau projet d’apatite de Mine Arnaud. Ci-dessus, un modèle du complexeminier prévu pour ce projet situé à Sept-Îles.

Gracieuseté de Mine Arnaud

Planifier à l’avanceLe Québec souhaite raviver l’enthousiasme pour les projets miniers dans le Nord

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a publié son rapport sur le projet,concluant qu’il n’était « pas acceptabledans sa forme actuelle. » Mine Arnauda pris 17 nouveaux engagements afinde répondre aux inquiétudes d’ordreenvironnemental décrites dans le rap-port. En plus de révéler de nombreuseslacunes écologiques, le BAPE a égale-ment mis en doute la rentabilité mêmedu projet, qui mise sur un prix de125 $ la tonne de phosphate pour êtreviable. Or, le prix du phosphate stagneà 115 $ la tonne depuis septembre.Par ailleurs, la Côte-Nord a cruelle-

ment besoin de signes positifs après les

fermetures successives de l’usine debouletage de Pointe-Noire et de lamine de Lac Bloom. Beaucoup consi-dèrent Mine Arnaud comme un tam-pon dans l’économie locale, dontRussell Tremblay, directeur adjoint àDéveloppement économique Sept-Îles.« Nous devons rallier les personnes quiont perdu leur emploi, sans quoi nousrisquons de les perdre à jamais »,déclarait-il. « Mine Arnaud évoluerasur un cycle différent que celui duminerai de fer. »Il semble que le gouvernement pro-

vincial, souvent critiqué pour avoir fait

faux bond à la région pendant lesphases de ralentissement du marchédes marchandises, ait été sensible auxarguments de M. Tremblay. Le 16 mars, le ministre de l’envi-

ronnement a donné son feu vert auprojet de 850 millions $. Mine Arnaudest présentement à la recherche d’untroisième partenaire pour exploiter lamine. « Dès que nous trouverons unexploitant, les participations dans leprojet évolueront, et celle d’Investisse-ment Québec devrait diminuer »,concluait M. Blanchette. – Antoine Dion-Ortega

Nomination d’un conseiller en RSE par le gouvernement fédéralM. Davidson arrive au terme d’un

contrat de cinq ans avec l’UniversitéQueen’s dans le cadre duquel il dis-pense des cours sur l’économie de l’in-dustrie des minéraux et sur ladurabilité et assure la coordination ducertificat d’études supérieures en rela-tions communautaires pour les indus-

les actualités en bref


L’ICM, C’EST :BILL WRIGHTDirecteur du développement de l’entreprise, RungePincockMinarcoMembre corporatif de l’ICM / Membre du conseil de direction de l’IEF / Président de la conférence sur la gestion de la sécurité et la fi abilité des systèmes / Exposant à l’EXPO! de l’ICM / Président aux séances techniques de MEMO et du congrès de l’ICM / Membre du groupe sur les normes et les directives mondiales en matière d’exploitation minière

Nos membres font la force de l’ICM.

L’ICM OFFRE UNE VALEUR AJOUTÉE À SES 15 000 MEMBRES

IMPLIQUEZ-VOUS. C’EST VALORISANT.

« L’ICM me donne la possibilité de discuter de tout un éventail de thèmes tels que l’innovation technologique avec les chefs de fi le de l’industrie minière. Ma participation active à l’ICM m’a permis d’élargir et de renforcer mon réseau en développant des relations durables avec des professionnels chevronnés de l’industrie minière. »

Début mars, Jeffrey Davidson a éténommé conseiller en responsabilitésociale des entreprises (RSE) duCanada pour l’industrie extractive.Le ministre du Commerce internatio-

nal, Ed Fast, en a fait l’annonce le jour del’ouverture du Congrès de l’Associationcanadienne des prospecteurs et entre-

preneurs (ACPE) de cette année, àToronto. « Je suis heureux à l’idée qu’une per-

sonne aussi hautement qualifiée etexpérimentée que Jeffrey Davidson serale nouveau conseiller en RSE », adéclaré le ministre Fast dans sonannonce.


tries extractives, du département degénie minier. M. Davidson a œuvré auparavant

dans le domaine des relations commu-nautaires pour la Banque mondiale etpour diverses sociétés minières, dontRio Tinto. Il a également enseigné l’éco-nomie minière à l’Université McGill. Tout au long de sa carrière, M.

Davidson s’est attaché à travailler avecles communautés et les sociétés pour « trouver de meilleures façons de tenircompte des préoccupations sociales etenvironnementales des communautés etpour faire en sorte que les activitésminières soient menées de façon res-ponsable », a-t-il déclaré. « [Le poste]m’a semblé très intéressant, et j’ai penséque je pourrai peut-être jouer un rôlepositif. » En novembre, le gouvernement fédé-

ral a publié une version actualisée de lastratégie en RSE pour les sociétésminières œuvrant à l’étranger. Elle élar-git les pouvoirs du bureau du conseilleren RSE pour y inclure une collaborationavec l’industrie extractive visant àencourager les sociétés minières à adop-ter des pratiques exemplaires en RSE etprévoit également repérer et résoudredès le début les litiges entre les sociétéset les communautés avoisinantes. Leposte de conseiller était vacant depuis lemois d’octobre 2013 à la suite de ladémission de Marketa Evans qui l’avaitoccupé pendant quatre ans.M. Davidson commencera son man-

dat de trois ans à la mi-mai. – Kelsey Rolfe

Un groupe de travail indépendantmandaté par l’Association minière duCanada (AMC) pour examiner les exi-gences de cette dernière en matière degestion des résidus miniers tiendra sapremière réunion le 8 avril. L’initiativea été lancée dans la foulée d’uneenquête de la Colombie-Britanniquesur le bris de la digue à résidus deMount Polley, qui a déversé 13,8 mil-lions de mètres cubes de boue deforage dans le ruisseau Hazeltine setrouvant à proximité. Le groupe de travail, dirigé par

Doug Horswill, ancien président duconseil de l’AMC, examine les lignesdirectrices et les exigences de l’AMC enmatière de gestion des résidus dans lecadre du programme intitulé Vers ledéveloppement minier durable (VDMD)et formulera des recommandationsquant aux secteurs où les règlesdevraient être renforcées pour éviter unautre déversement à grande échelle. Impe-rial Metals, propriétaire de Mount Polley,est membre de l’AMC depuis la fin de2012 et en est au début de l’implantationdu programme VDMD, son premier profild’entreprise ayant figuré dans le Rapportd’étapes VDMD 2014.Les lignes directrices actuelles du

programme VDMD sur la gestion desrésidus mettent l’accent sur les pra-tiques exemplaires comprenant l’attri-bution de la responsabilité de lagestion des résidus à un haut dirigeantde l’entreprise qui mènera des inspec-tions périodiques pour gérer lesrisques et qui mettra en œuvre despolitiques solides pour assurer laconformité avec les lois et les lignesdirectrices de l’AMC.« Certaines questions sur la concep-

tion et la construction ne sont pas cou-vertes dans les protocoles », a déclaréM. Horswill. « Je ne sais pas si ellespeuvent l’être, mais nous devons déter-miner si c’est faisable ou pas. »Le groupe de travail étudie égale-

ment le rapport et les recommanda-tions déposés en janvier par le groupede trois experts nommés par le gouver-

Une association de l’industrie examine les lignesdirectrices sur la gestion des résidus miniers

nement de la Colombie-Britanniquepour enquêter sur la brèche de MountPolley. Le rapport a mis en cause undéfaut de conception dans la digue quin’était pas associé à une instabilité desfondations.« Aucun de nous ne se sent bien par

rapport à l’événement qui s’est produit,ni aucun de nous ne voulait qu’il sur-vienne », a affirmé M. Horswill. « C’estpourquoi nous devons comprendre, enfonction des données dont nous dispo-sons actuellement […] s’il existe ounon des moyens d’améliorer lesméthodes de gestion des résidus dansle programme VDMD. »Les sept membres du groupe de tra-

vail de l’AMC comprennent Peter Ligh-thall, consultant indépendant ayantdéjà travaillé pour AMEC et KlohnCrippen ; John Sobkowicz, de ThurberEngineering ; Nalaine Morin, de Tahl-tan Heritage Resources EnvironmentalAssessment Team ; Alan Young, de laCampagne internationale pour la conser-vation boréale et membre du Groupeconsultatif des communautés d’intérêts del’AMC ; Craig Ford, de Corporate Respon-sibility Solutions ; et Michael Davies, deTeck Resources Limited et président duGroupe de travail sur les résidus del’AMC.VDMD est un programme obliga-

toire lancé en 2004 pour toutes lessociétés membres de l’AMC afin de lesinciter à travailler de manière plus res-ponsable d’un point de vue social etenvironnemental. Le rendement desmembres est évalué en fonction de 23indicateurs et les résultats sont publiéschaque année dans des rapportsd’étapes VDMD.Dans un communiqué, Pierre Grat-

ton, président et chef de la direction del’AMC, a vanté le succès de l’initiativeVDMD pour assurer une exploitationsécuritaire des parcs à résidus, mais areconnu qu’il y a place à l’amélioration.« Nous sommes d’avis qu’il y a tou-jours de la place à l’amélioration etnous voulons apprendre de l’incidentde Mount Polley afin de nous assurer

Jeffrey Davidson (ci-dessus), le nouveau conseiller enresponsabilité sociale des entreprises de l’industrieextractive du Canada

Gracieuseté du ministère des Affa

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commerce et d

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que cela ne se reproduira plus », a-t-ildéclaré.Le groupe de travail présentera un

rapport avec ses recommandations àl’AMC avant la fin de 2015, l’organisa-tion décidera alors des mesures àprendre. – Sahar Fatima

Une vive compétition auxJeux miniers annuels L’Université de la Saskatchewan a

accueilli des équipes de 10 universitésdu pays en février à l’occasion des 24e

Jeux miniers canadiens annuels.Du 18 au 22 février, 150 étudiants

se sont affrontés dans le cadre de25 compétitions au cours desquelles ilsont été jugés par des représentants desnombreuses entreprises commandi-taires des Jeux, dont PotashCorp,Cameco et Imperial Mines.

Les épreuves ont été conçuespour être difficiles, a expliqué le copré-sident Tanner Edwards. Au cours del’une d’elles, les équipes ont dû conce-voir une mine en sept heures. « C’estune tâche pour ainsi dire impossible,mais il s’agissait d’évaluer ce qui pou-vait être accompli », a-t-il poursuivi. D’autres défis ont testé toute une

gamme de compétences, non seule-ment celles touchant au génie, maiségalement des aptitudes telles que l’artde parler en public, les connaissancesen finances et en mathématiques et lafaculté de travailler sous pression. Laplupart des épreuves étaient terminéesau bout de trois heures. Par le passé, les juges accordaient

aux équipes une note en pourcentagepour leur performance au cours d’unévénement donné. Cette année, cepen-dant, des points entre 0 et 10 ont étéattribués aux équipes afin de faciliter lechoix du gagnant. Les résultats ont étéannoncés lors du banquet de clôture.L’Université Queens s’est classée pre-mière, l’Université de Toronto,deuxième et l’École Polytechnique deMontréal, troisième. Malgré le stress, ces jeux ont été des

plus amusants cette année, selonM. Edwards. Un dîner-banquet suivid’excursions dans les bistros avoisi-nants étaient au programme de chaque

soirée. « La fin de semaine a été toutsimplement fantastique », a résumé M.Edwards.L’ICM était un commanditaire

argent pour cet événement. – Katelyn Spidle

Une petite société minièreperformanteGrâce au rendement affiché par ses

actions en 2014, la société NioCorp aété classée en tête des sociétés minièresles plus performantes dans le palmarèsTSX Croissance 50 de la Bourse decroissance TSX. Le 11 février, au moment de l’an-

nonce de cette distinction par lasociété, ses actions étaient évaluées à0,83 $, ce qui représente une progres-sion de 25 % par rapport à la mêmejournée l’an dernier. La société avaitégalement une capitalisation boursièrede 102,68 millions de dollars, enhausse comparativement à 24,1 mil-lions de dollars le 14 février 2014. Plustôt au cours du mois, NioCorp aannoncé avoir plus que triplé les res-sources indiquées de pentoxyde deniobium à son projet Elk Creek, auNebraska, lesquelles se chiffrent à572 000 tonnes, par rapport à177 000 tonnes.Autre preuve de l’excellente perfor-

mance de NioCorp, ses actions ordi-naires ont été inscrites à la cote de laBourse de Toronto le 9 mars.Compilé par la Bourse de crois-

sance TSX, le palmarès TSX Crois-sance 50 comprend dix sociétés dechacun des cinq secteurs d’activité sui-

vants : mines, pétrole et gaz, technolo-gie et sciences de la vie, industriesdiversifiées et technologies propres. Leclassement est établi en fonction de laperformance affichée dans quatre caté-gories : appréciation du cours de l’ac-tion, volume de négociation,couverture par les analystes et augmen-tation de la capitalisation boursière. Voici les sociétés minières les plus

performantes selon le palmarèsTSX Croissance 50 de 2015 :

Niocorp Developments Ltd.

Excelsior Mining Corp.

Nevada Sunrise Gold Corporation

NexGen Energy Ltd.

Roxgold Inc.

Ascot Resources Ltd.

Bacanora Minerals Ltd.

Kaminak Gold Corporation

Red Eagle Mining Corporation

Columbus Gold Corporation

– K.S.

Noront achète les actifs deCliffs dans le Cercle de feu La société minière américaine Cliffs

Natural Resources a décidé de se retirerde la région du Cercle de feu. NorontResources a annoncé en mars qu’ellerachetait les propriétés de chromite deCliffs dans le Cercle de feu au vu de ladécision de cette dernière de quittercette région riche en ressources, bienque très isolée.Cette transaction, d’une valeur de

20 millions $ US, devrait se conclure àla mi-avril, en fonction de la décisiondu tribunal autorisant Cliffs à restruc-turer ses exploitations de minerai defer au Québec. La société Franco-Nevada Corporation prêtera 22,5 mil-lions $ US à Noront à un taux d’intérêtde 7 % pour financer la transaction, enéchange d’une faible part des rede-vances issues des propriétés du Cerclede feu acquises par la société.« Cette acquisition vient consolider

les découvertes de classe mondiale réa-lisées dans la région du Cercle de feu »,déclarait Alan Coutts, président et

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Participants aux Jeuxminiers canadiens

Gracieuseté de Tanner Edw

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Chris Twigge-Molecey, ancienprésident de l’ICM et actuelconseiller principal chez Hatch, adonné un aperçu rapide deMetallurgical Plant Design (dispo-nible en anglais seulement), unnouvel ouvrage auquel il a colla-boré à la rédaction et à la mise enforme avec Rob Boom, FrankWheeler et Jack Young, ingé-nieurs métallurgistes. Certainschapitres du livre ont été rédigés

par 13 autres spécialistes en métallurgie du Japon, desÉtats-Unis et d’Australie. « Il présente véritablement unevision d’ensemble du secteur des projets », dit-il.Le lancement de l’ouvrage à couverture rigide de

200 pages se fera dans le cadre du congrès annuel de l’ICM,qui se tiendra cette année à Montréal, du 9 au 13 mai.

ICM : Pourquoi était-il important de publier cet ouvrage ?Twigge-Molecey : Nous estimions qu’il existait une lacuneimportante sur le plan de la documentation, surtout dansle domaine de la métallurgie, où il semble ne rien existerdu tout. De nombreux ouvrages traitent des principes fon-damentaux de l’ingénierie, de la gestion de projets et de la

gestion de construction de projets,mais il s’est écrit très peu de choses surla fonction de la conception elle-mêmeliée au transfert de connaissances debase dans une usine exploitable.

ICM : Comment expliquez-vous cettelacune ?Twigge-Molecey : C’est une lacune pardéfaut. De façon générale, la concep-tion d’usines n’est pas un domaine derecherche que privilégient les profes-seurs; ils se concentrent plutôt sur lesprincipes fondamentaux. Et les profes-sionnels dans le domaine rédigent rare-ment des ouvrages.

ICM : Pourquoi cet ouvrage est-il particulièrement pertinentmaintenant ? Twigge-Molecey : Nous y travaillons depuis quelquesannées. La méthodologie que nous énonçons dans ce livreest bien connue et a fait ses preuves à maintes reprises. Ilest temps de faire le point des enseignements tirés. Il estégalement temps pour les différents intervenants et spécia-listes dans le domaine de les assimiler avant de passer auprochain cycle, étant donné que la métallurgie doit actuel-lement composer avec d’importantes contraintes sur leplan de l’accès aux capitaux.

ICM : Qu’espérez-vous accomplir avec ce livre ?Twigge-Molecey : Favoriser une meilleure compréhension.De nombreux projets ont échoué au cours des dernièresdécennies parce que des personnes ont pris des décisionssans en mesurer les conséquences. Ce livre s’adresse auxpersonnes qui prennent les décisions, mais qui n’ont pasd’expérience concrète de projets. Elles ne mesurent pasl’influence que le volet ingénierie – même s’il ne représentequ’une petite partie du coût – a sur le projet global : soncoût en capital, son exploitabilité et sa capacité à se confor-mer aux normes de rendement attendues, comme la sécu-rité, la productivité, l’impact environnemental et ladurabilité. – K.S.

De meilleurs résultats grâce à la conception

Metallurgical Plant Design, un ouvrage visant à combler

des lacunes sur le plan des connaissances

directeur général de Noront. « Nousavons beaucoup investi dans le Cerclede feu et notre équipe est devenue unevéritable experte de cette région despoints de vue technique autant quesocial. »Le Cercle de feu, une région en

forme de croissant située au nord deThunder Bay, présente un fort potentielminier car elle renferme d’importants

gisements de chromite, de platine, denickel et d’autres métaux. Cependant,ce secteur n’est desservi par aucuneroute, d’où la décision de Cliffs en2013 de suspendre ses activités dans larégion.Cette vente entraîne le transfert des

droits de propriété d’environ 100concessions minières à Noront, dontl’intégralité des gisements de chromite

Black Thor et Black Label. La transac-tion comprend également une partici-pation de 70 % dans le gisement dechromite Big Daddy et un droit de pro-priété de 85 % dans une ressource decuivre et de zinc près du lac McFauld.Noront est déjà propriétaire du projetpolymétallique Eagle’s Nest dans larégion et, d’après un communiqué depresse, détiendra désormais environ

Normand Hu

berdeau/NH Photograph

es Ltée.

May/Mai 2015 | 101

65 % des terres comprises dans lesconcessions minières du Cercle de feu.« La vente de ces actifs à Noront,

une société minière qui possède unegrande expérience dans la région duCercle de feu et y détient des intérêtsstratégiques, vient confirmer l’exécu-tion de la stratégie de Cliffs quiimplique de se séparer de ses actifs nonessentiels et de se concentrer sur sonrôle de fournisseur principal de bou-lettes de minerai de fer pour l’industriede l’acier d’Amérique du Nord », pou-vait-on lire dans un communiqué depresse de Cliffs.En novembre dernier, Cliffs a

annoncé qu’il étudiait ses options dedésengagement de ses exploitations deminerai de fer dans l’est du Canada,notamment la mine Wabush Scully enTerre-Neuve-et-Labrador, qui a mis enœuvre un plan de fermeture perma-nente en novembre en raison de sastructure de coûts élevés, et la mineBloom Lake au Québec, que Cliffsplace sous la protection de la loi sur lesfaillites. – S.F.

Le tribunal décrète quePascua-Lama n’a causéaucun dégât

Le projet Pascua-Lama de BarrickGold, qui a traversé de grandes difficul-tés, a eu de bonnes nouvelles récem-ment.Le 23 mars dernier, le tribunal de

l’environnement du Chili a décrété quele projet Pascua-Lama, établi dans leshauts plateaux andins, n’avait causéaucun dégât aux glaciers situés dans lesaires d’influence immédiates. « Nous sommes heureux que le tri-

bunal ait confirmé aujourd’hui ce que lespreuves techniques et scientifiquesdémontrent, à savoir que les activitésmenées dans le cadre du projet Pascua-Lama n’ont pas endommagé ces massesde glace », expliquait Eduardo Flores,directeur exécutif de Barrick pour leChili.En octobre 2013, suite à des pro-

blèmes financiers et juridiques, Barrickavait suspendu la construction à sa mined’or, d’argent et de cuivre, qui se trouve

à la frontière entre le Chili et l’Argentine.Au début de cette même année, la Coursuprême du Chili avait déclaré que lasociété devait régler le problème de sonsystème inachevé de gestion de l’eau àPascua-Lama. Le déclin des prix de l’or,associé à la hausse des coûts, avaientégalement pesé dans la décision de lasociété de suspendre le projet, dont laproduction devait initialement commen-cer l’été dernier. La société, basée à Toronto, a main-

tenu qu’elle était décidée à développer samine de 8,5 milliards $ dans le plus

grand respect de l’environnement. Outresa collaboration avec les communautéslocales pour être sûre de répondre auxexigences environnementales, Barrick aaussi mis en œuvre un programme desurveillance sur le site de Pascua-Lamaqui recueille des données de 27 pointsdifférents et envoie directement lesrésultats aux autorités réglementaires.Une fois en activité, le projet Pascua-

Lama devrait produire en moyenneentre 800 000 et 850 000 onces d’or paran durant ses cinq premières annéesd’activité. – Michael Yang


SUR L’ENVIRONNEMENT ET LES MINESMINES AND THE ENVIRONMENT

SYMPOSIUM 2015 • ROUYN-NORANDA

Suivez les publications de l’ICM pour plus de détails et visitez notre site WEB à :

ROUYN-NORANDA2015.CIM.ORG

DIMANCHE 14 JUIN : COURS INTENSIFS

LUNDI ET MARDI 15 ET 16 JUIN : PROGRAMME TECHNIQUE PORTANT SUR : • Rejets miniers • Remblais souterrains• Roches stériles• Prédiction de la qualité des eaux• Traitement des eaux• Restauration des sites• Réglementation/société• Innovation (nouvelles tendances)Traduction simultanée : Français-Anglais / Anglais-FrançaisMERCREDI 17 JUIN : VISITES DE SITES

Pour plus d’information, contactez : Nadia Bakka (ICM) : 514-939-2710, 1333, [email protected]

INSCRIVEZ-VOUS MAINTENANT


Le rite minier du printemps Tout comme le cours de l’or au cœur

de l’événement, le nombre de partici-pants présents au Congrès annuel del’ACPE a baissé par rapport aux niveauxhistoriques d’il y a quelques années.Toutefois, le congrès a tout de même ras-semblé 23 500 personnes début mars.Joe Oliver, ministre fédéral des

Finances, a profité de l’occasion pourprolonger le crédit d’impôt pour l’explo-ration minière pour une autre année. Cecrédit permet aux entreprises qui émet-tent des actions accréditives de transfé-rer un pourcentage de leurs dépensesd’exploration à leurs actionnaires, quipeuvent à leur tour les déduire de leurrevenu imposable. Ce crédit, créé pour la première fois

en 2000, est intéressant pour les inves-tisseurs qui autrement ne prendraientpas de risques sur des projets d’explora-tion en phase initiale. Le renouvelle-ment annuel du crédit est devenu unrituel du printemps depuis l’expirationde son délai initial de trois ans. Toute-fois, le ministre des Finances a proposéquelque chose de nouveau, en ajoutantles coûts de certaines consultationsenvironnementales et auprès desAutochtones nécessaires avant que lespermis d’exploration soient admissiblesà la déduction des dépenses d’explora-tion au Canada. Cet ajout « est assez important parce

que ces coûts augmentent. Il y a vingtans, ils n’existaient pas », a fait remar-quer Rodney Thomas, président del’ACPE, dans une entrevue donnée àCIM Magazine. Le gouvernement fédérals’est aussi engagé à partager le coûtd’une étude de 785 000 $ avec le gou-vernement de l’Ontario visant laconstruction d’une route permanenteest-ouest qui relierait le Cercle de feuavec un certain nombre de communau-tés autochtones à la route existante quise termine à Pickle Lake – à environ 300km vers le sud-ouest.Le marché actuel tendu a diminué

le nombre d’entreprises membres del’ACPE, mais certains spécialistes ontremarqué un accroissement des activi-tés commerciales. Par exemple, cette

année de nombreux exposants com-mercialisaient les services de véhiculesaériens sans pilote (les drones). MikeReed, directeur commercial, industrieminière, pour le fabricant de dronesLeica Geosystems, a expliqué quel’imagination des sociétés minièress’enflammait une fois qu’elles consta-taient ce que l’équipement d’imageriefixé sur les drones pouvait faire, quece soit pour surveiller des paroishautes auparavant inaccessibles, four-nir une solution de rechange aux ins-pections coûteuses et chronophagesou procurer un système de sur-veillance économique. Toutefois, les observateurs du marché

n’ont pas vanté 2015 comme une annéeexceptionnelle, bien qu’ils demeurentoptimistes pour les prospects à plus longterme sur le marché des métaux. Martin Murenbeeld, économiste en

chef chez Dundee Capital, a suggéré quecertaines forces motrices, comme leralentissement de l’économie mondialeet la vigueur du dollar américain com-penseraient les hausses de prix pos-sibles, et maintiendraient les cours del’or dans la fourchette de 1 250 $US àcourt terme. En évoquant le marché desmétaux dans son ensemble à l’occasiond’un forum très suivi, M. Murenbeeld adéclaré : « nous sommes dans un cycledes matières premières à très long terme.Aujourd’hui, on observe une correctionde milieu de cycle. »À l’occasion d’une séance distincte,

Patricia Mohr, spécialiste du marché desproduits de base à la Banque Scotia, aprédit que « les prix des matières pre-mières seront à leur plus bas cette année,mais ne remonteront pas. Il va falloirattendre 2017 ou 2018 pour que le mar-ché reprenne. » Rodney Thomas, de l’ACPE, a évo-

qué la prise de contrôle amicale de ProbeMines par Goldcorp, en soulignant quece projet de développement pourraitdynamiser les petites sociétés minières.Le projet Borden de Probe Mines, prèsde Chapleau, en Ontario, a fait l’objetd’une offre de 526 millions de dollars decette importante société aurifère plus tôtcette année. Le congrès de l’ACPE de l’an pro-

chain aura lieu du 6 au 9 mars au Palais

des congrès du Toronto métropolitain. – Ryan Bergen

Perspectives d’avenirS’il est impossible de prédire l’avenir,

cela n’a empêché personne de s’y essayerlors de la séance d’ouverture du Congrès2015 de la Society for Mining, Metal-lurgy and Exploration où des sages del’industrie se sont interrogés sur les diffi-cultés et les opportunités auxquelles l’in-dustrie doit s’attendre dans les années àvenir. La discussion a marqué le lance-ment de cet événement annuel ayantréuni plus de 6 000 personnes qui ontparticipé à plus de 100 séances tech-niques et 670 sociétés exposantes auPalais des congrès du Colorado, à Den-ver, en février.Tous les orateurs se sont entendus

pour dire que la technologie serait lemoteur de l’innovation dans la « minedu futur. » Cependant, le modérateur dela séance, Peter Bryant, agrégé supérieurauprès du Kellogg Innovation Network,a souligné que l’industrie minière y arelativement peu contribué. « L’industrie[minière] investit, selon la plupart desétudes, quelque chose comme ¼ % à ½ % dans la recherche et le développe-ment », a-t-il précisé, alors que les socié-tés industrielles y investissent de 1,5 % à2 %, les sociétés pétrolières et gazières,5 %, et les sociétés aérospatiales, de 8 %à 10 %.Gwenne Henricks, vice-présidente

de Caterpillar, responsable de la divi-sion Développement des produits ettechnologie mondiale, et directrice dela technologie, a mis l’accent sur le rôlede l’analyse des données et des méga-données dans l’innovation minière,tendance qui va se poursuivre croit-elle. « [La] croissance exponentielle enmatière de puissance informatique etde stockage des données nous offre lapossibilité de recueillir et d’analyserdes données qui peuvent être utiliséespour assurer notre productivité au longde toute la chaîne de valeur », a-t-ellesouligné. « Grâce aux capacités infiniesde l’infonuagique, associées à l’émer-gence des réseaux de capteurs, les don-nées peuvent être analysées et fournirune base en temps réel aux décisions

May/Mai 2015 | 103

prises à tous les niveaux, des respon-sables de la planification minière, àceux de l’exploitation ou auxconducteurs d’équipement. »

Dean Gehring, président et chef dela direction de Rio Tinto Minerals,reconnaît aussi que les données joue-ront un rôle important, non seulementen matière de technologie, mais aussidans les réglementations gouverne-mentales. Il prédit qu’un jour viendraoù des quantités massives de donnéesrecueillies par les sociétés minièresseront envoyées en temps réel auxorganismes de réglementation. « Celainstaurera une transparence à un degrédifférent de celui auquel nous sommeshabitués », a poursuivi M. Gehring.

Bryan Galli, coordinateur en chef etdirecteur du marketing à PeabodyEnergy, a souligné l’importance deconstantes innovations dans le passé. « Depuis 1970, le charbon utilisé pourproduire de l’électricité a augmenté deplus de 170 % alors que le PIB a dou-blé et que les principales émissions parkilowattheure ont diminué de presque90 % », a-t-il dit, ajoutant que cesconsidérables améliorations résultentprincipalement d’initiatives et de tech-nologies propres dans le secteur ducharbon.


Dean Gehring, président et directeur général de RioTinto Minerals, s’exprime à l’occasion de la sessionliminaire de la conférence de la Society for Mining,Metallurgy and Exploration (SME, la société des mines,de la métallurgie et de l’exploration) à Denver en février.

Grac

ieus

eté

de S

ME

Évaluation de territoires attrayants pour les minièresL’Institut Fraser a publié récemment son enquête annuelIe sur les sociétés

minières. L’Institut a reçu plus de 480 réponses au sondage envoyé à des socié-tés œuvrant dans le secteur minier, en particulier dans l’exploration et le déve-loppement, afin d’évaluer 122 territoires dans le monde. Dans le but dedéterminer les attraits présentés par chacun pour y investir, l’Institut Fraser acombiné son indice d’évaluation des territoires selon leur attrait géologique etson indice de perception des politiques visant à mesurer l’incidence des poli-tiques gouvernementales sur l’attitude des sociétés en matière d’investissementdans l’exploration. Voici certains des résultats de cette enquête : T.D.

Les 10 territoires miniers les plus attrayants dans le monde

Degré d’attrait des provinces canadiennes en termes d’investissement

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1 Finlande 2 Saskatchewan 3 Nevada 4 Manitoba 5 Australie-Occidentale

6 Québec 7 Wyoming 8 Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador 9 Yukon10 Alaska

62.67070.574.574.874.9

80.180.781.582.983.676

Degré médian d’attrait en termes d’investissement dans le monde

May/Mai 2015 | 105

Autrefois, décrocher un emploi dans le secteur miniersignifiait souvent qu’on devait s’installer et s’enracinerdans une ville ou un village créé autour d’une mine.

Mais, au Canada, la dernière de ces villes – Tumbler Ridge,en Colombie-Britannique – a été construite il y a plus de 30ans. Selon une recherche effectuée par Keith Storey, de l’Uni-versité Memorial de Terre-Neuve, les importantes fluctuationssubies par le secteur des minerais, l’arrivée du télétravail, unepénurie de main-d’œuvre et le manque de perspectivesoffertes par les villes minières, particulièrement pour lesfemmes, ont tous contribué à la disparition progressive desvilles minières champignons.

Aujourd’hui, les déplacements sur de longues distances etla vie dans les camps sont devenus les modèles, dont les par-ticularités sont uniques et parfois ardues. Bien qu’il soit diffi-cile d’évaluer l’augmentation du nombre de travailleurs vivantcette réalité, on compte aujourd’hui dans le monde desdizaines de milliers de travailleurs se rendant dans des campséloignés, soit par la route, soit par la voie des airs. Par exem-ple, en Australie-Occidentale, le nombre de mines où les tra-vailleurs vivent dans des camps est passé d’environ 26 en1991 à plus de 100 en 2005.

Pour le travailleur, la vie au camp signifie qu’il doit affronterl’isolement social, de longues heures de travail et de rudesconditions météorologiques, tout en essayant d’équilibrer sesdeux vies : celle à la mine et celle à la maison. Les travailleursnavetteurs gagnent un bon salaire et ont accès à des commo-dités modernes, mais la séparation d’avec la famille et les amispeut créer un problème affectif auquel les sociétés tentent deplus en plus de répondre.

« Les sociétés font un certain nombre de choses qui ontune incidence », affirme Adrian Blanco, ancien gestionnairede l’approvisionnement à Hochschild Mining (il travaille àprésent pour McEwen Mining). Jusqu’à tout dernièrement, il

passait entre 35 et 40 % de son temps au camp minier SanJosé, en Argentine. « Si des gens pratiquent des activités quine sont pas liées au travail, cela crée un meilleur environne-ment en matière de qualité de vie et améliore aussi la produc-tivité et le respect des normes de sécurité. »

La vie de camp est unique en ce sens que lorsqu’unemployé s’y trouve pendant des semaines, la conciliation vieprofessionnelle-vie personnelle est impossible. Joanne Klein,vice-présidente des ressources humaines de Goldcorp,explique que sa société fait en sorte que les employés ne sen-tent pas qu’ils ratent des aspects importants de leur vie per-sonnelle ou familiale. « Je crois qu’on y arrive aussi par depetites choses », ajoute-t-elle. « Quand j’étais à Musselwhite,récemment, je suis entrée dans la cafétéria et j’ai vu un grandtableau blanc sur lequel on annonçait l’anniversaire d’unemployé. Il y avait un gros gâteau, et je crois que de tellesactions jouent un grand rôle pour que les gens se sentent àla maison. »

M. Blanco acquiesce : même de petits gestes améliorent debeaucoup les conditions de vie des travailleurs navetteurs. Parexemple, quand la haute direction et les membres du conseild’administration visitent les sites d’exploitation, en Argentine,tout le monde mange ensemble dans la salle à manger pourque tous se sentent égaux et justement appréciés. « Lesemployés prennent leur déjeuner, leur dîner et leur souper aumême endroit pendant des semaines d’affilée. Ce sont desmoments qu’ils partagent avec tous les autres ; ce sont desmoments spéciaux dans la journée. »

Échanges interculturelsEn règle générale, à la mine Raglan, au Nunavik, au Qué-

bec, les travailleurs navetteurs restent de deux à trois semainessur le site, puis passent de deux à trois semaines chez eux. La

Les avantages meconnus du travail en region eloigneeComment les sociétés aident leurs employés à vivre une vie plus riche au campPar Katelyn SpidleIllustrations par Clare Mallison


société a lancé plusieurs initiatives pour aider les travailleursà composer avec leur double mode de vie. Par exemple, enplus d’offrir à chaque employé un cadeau le matin de Noël, lasociété invite des artistes inuits de la région à tenir une foired’artisanat à l’occasion de la Journée internationale des peu-ples autochtones.

« La foire d’artisanat nous permet de promouvoir la cultureinuit », remarque Céliane Dorval, coordonnatrice des com-munications et des relations extérieures à Raglan, « et ça per-met aux employés inuits et non-inuits de partager dans uneatmosphère chaleureuse. » Raglan a aussi mis sur pied uncomité de loisirs qui organise régulièrement des soirées dejeux, des barbecues, des concerts, des spectacles humoris-tiques et même des parties de golf, dans le sud, pour les tra-vailleurs navetteurs en congé.

Les liens entre le camp minier et la culture locale permet-tent aux travailleurs navetteurs de cultiver un sens de fierté,fait remarquer M. Blanco. Parmi les moyens mis en œuvre parla société minière pour encourager le partage, elle demandeaux travailleurs de faire visiter la mine à la population de larégion et de lui proposer des activités. « Ces visites créent nonseulement un sens de responsabilité envers la population,mais aussi un sens d’appartenance à la société et de fierté pource que celle-ci accomplit dans toute la région », conclutM. Blanco.

Corps sains, mine saineLes avantages de l’activité physique ont fait l’objet de nom-

breuses recherches et sont bien documentés. Être en bonneforme physique diminue les risques de maladie et de blessure,en plus d’avoir des effets bénéfiques sur la santé mentale. Deplus en plus, les sociétés équipent leurs mines de gymnasesmis gratuitement à la disposition des employés en vue d’amé-liorer la productivité et le moral.

« À Cigar Lake, le club de loisirs de Cameco tente d’offrirtoute une gamme d’activités physiques et sociales à sesemployés et entrepreneurs pour qu’ils puissent s’occuperaprès le travail », explique Trevor Gonzales, généraliste en res-sources humaines à Cameco. Il décrit le gymnase de dimen-sion réglementaire de la mine, où les travailleurs jouent auhockey en salle, au soccer, au badminton, au volleyball et aubasketball. Les employés peuvent aussi participer à unconcours de sculpture de citrouilles dans le temps de l’Hallo-ween, regarder des combats extrêmes ou des galas de boxe àla carte ou participer à des compétitions sportives avec lesemployés des mines avoisinantes.

Les mines de Goldcorp possèdent aussi des installations deconditionnement physique remarquables, mais ChristineMarks, directrice des communications de la société, expliqueque ces installations sont différentes d’un site à l’autre. « ÀPeñasquito, au Mexique, il y a un beau terrain de soccer. Maisavoir un tel terrain dans le nord du Québec en hiver n’auraitaucun sens. » À Musselwhite, sur la rive sud du lac Opapi-miskan, l’équipement de pêche est très demandé.

Alimenter correctement toutes ces activités est essentiel« C’est pourquoi l’alimentation est très, très importante »,affirme Mme Klein, ajoutant que l’alimentation varie aussi

d’un site et d’une culture à l’autre. « Nous sommes chanceuxparce que l’entreprise de traiteur que nous utilisons à Mus-selwhite appartient aux Premières Nations. » Windigo Cate-ring, qui dessert la mine, située à 480 kilomètres au nord deThunder Bay, emploie des gens de la région et incorpore desaliments traditionnels, comme la bannique et de la vianded’animaux sauvages, au menu.

Atteindre un équilibreÀ Raglan, les conjointes et les conjoints sont invités trois

fois par an à visiter le site. « C’est une excellente façon de lesaider à comprendre ce que fait leur conjoint ou leur conjointesur le site minier et de voir par eux-mêmes comment on yvit », a indiqué Mme Dorval, « Les familles jouent un rôleimportant dans la fidélisation des employés, aussi devons-nous établir des liens avec eux et veiller à leur bien-être. »

Cependant, aider les travailleurs navetteurs à se connecterquotidiennement avec leur famille représente un des aspectsde la vie de camp que les sociétés ont de la difficulté à amé-liorer. Le coût de la connexion Internet est très élevé, particu-lièrement dans les lieux éloignés. Bien que la plupart desmines offrent une connexion réseau sans fil, M. Blancoexplique que cette dernière est souvent de trop mauvaise qua-lité pour les appels vidéo, situation très frustrante pour lesemployés qui ont hâte de voir le visage et d’entendre la voixdes membres de leur famille.

Bien qu’une connexion Internet fiable soit sans aucundoute devenue essentielle à la vie moderne, M. Blanco faitremarquer qu’une connexion sans fil à haute vitesse dans uncamp minier est une arme à double tranchant. De nombreuxemployés pourraient devenir dépendants d’Internet pour ledivertissement et les liens sociaux et passer tout leur tempslibre accrochés à un iPhone, à une tablette ou à un ordinateurportatif, ce qui les inciterait peu à faire de l’exercice, à parti-ciper à des activités ou à s’intégrer à la communauté des tra-vailleurs navetteurs.

« Pour les sociétés, c’est un tout nouveau défi que de gagnerles cœurs des employés avec des activités intéressantes quifavorisent le travail d’équipe », estime M. Blanco. Dans lesmines où il a travaillé, on encourageait la participation desemployés puisqu’on y proposait de nombreuses compétitionssportives entre divisions ainsi que de nombreux tournois.Selon M. Blanco, on note une augmentation de la participationlà où les sociétés proposent un calendrier de matches et offrentdes maillots et des prix et où on incite les travailleurs à trouverdes noms d’équipe originaux. De tels gestes créent une identité,laquelle à son tour forme un sens d’appartenance – particuliè-rement si les sports proposés font partie de la culture locale.

Un camp où les travailleurs navetteurs peuvent mener unevie profondément satisfaisante ne stimule pas que la produc-tivité, la sécurité et la santé, mais ouvre également la porte àdes expériences, à des relations et à des souvenirs marquants,lesquels peuvent durer toute une vie.

« J’ai vu de nombreux cas d’amitiés qui se sont prolongéesau-delà du travail à la mine », affirme M. Blanco. « C’est natu-rel. Vivre des conditions si difficiles peut sceller des lienssolides entre les gens. » ICM

8 Le revenu disponible est uneillusion, alors soyez économe.

-zmobie632

5 Pour les femmes : prenez un stock de tampons ! Vous en aurez besoin pour vous, certes, mais vous rendrez aussi service à vos (rares) collègues femmes qui pourraient avoir oublié d’en amener. -undertheaurora

9 Amenez des Tupperware !Si vous voulez un repas quiressemble à quelquechose, amenez quelquesTupperware sur lesquelsvous aurez inscrit votrenom. J’ai souvent pris mondéjeuner avec les collègueset, à force de transporterleurs repas dans lesracleurs souterrains, lesaliments ressemblenttoujours à une sorte debouillie écrasée. Ma saladeet mon sandwich, parcontre, sont intacts et bienplus appétissants.

-undertheaurora

11 Récupérez les sachets desauces et de condimentsau réfectoire pour éviterde vous retrouver àcourt ; ils disparaissentparfois pendant des jourset des semaines entières.

-mol3cul3

7 Rencontres sur Internet. Préparez le terrain quand vous êtes au campement, récoltez les fruitsde vos efforts quand vous rentrez chez vous.

-zmobie632

Que vous soyez un vétéranrusé ou une jeune recrue

essayant de ne pas se faireremarquer, ces conseils vousaideront à garder un certain

contrôle sur votre vie dans uncampement. Ces suggestionssont tirées d’une discussionque l’un de nos rédacteurs a

lancée sur reddit.com/r/mining(uniquement disponible enanglais) et sont publiées par

nom d’utilisateur. Certaines ontété modifiées en raison de leur

longueur et de fautesgrammaticales ou de

ponctuation.

conseils indispensables

pour survivre dans un campement isolé

121 Si votre campement dispose deconsignes, mettez-y tout ce quevous pouvez. Voyagez léger etévitez-vous une grande perte de temps à l’aéroport pourenregistrer vos bagages.

-mol3cul3

2 La connexion Internet dans les campements miniers estsouvent mauvaise. Préparez-vous à ne pas pouvoir accéder à Internet le soir (apportez des films sur une clé USB, des livres, ou tout ce qui peut vous aider àpasser le temps). -mol3cul3

3 Les bonbons et autres sucreries sont en général une bonne idée. Un opérateur de jumbo avec lequel je travaillais cachait toujours un sachet de sucettes dans la cabine qui, mystérieusement, faisait son apparition dès que l’appareilleur arrivait. Son jumbo fonctionnait toujours parfaitement.

-Maldevinine

6 Ne soyez pas idiot. -Kneep

May/Mai 2015 | 107

10 Liez-vous d’amitié avecl’informaticien, votrequotidien au campementn’en sera que facilité.

-Kneep

4 Videz votre frigo avant de partir, et nelaissez absolument rien à l’intérieur !

-the__funk

12 Logez chez vosparents ou votre famille sivous devez faire lanavette entre lecampement minier etvotre lieu de vie pendantplusieurs mois.

Pourquoi payer 100 % de votre loyerlorsque vous ne passez que 20 % de votretemps chez vous ? -fermilevel


Mihalis Theodorakopoulos, directeur général de Hellas Gold.Il travaille sur les mines de Cassandre, qui incluent les actifsde Skouries, Olympias et Stratoni, depuis plus de 25 ans,bien avant qu’elles ne deviennent la propriété d’une sociétécanadienne (la première était TVX Gold, en 1995). La mine

Des artéfacts miniers millénaires parsèment le bord de laroute alors que nous quittons le petit village de Stratoni,en bord de mer, et nous frayons un chemin vers les hau-

teurs en direction de Skouries, la mine d’or la plus récente deGrèce. « Pour nous, c’est un retour aux sources », déclarait

Le projet Skouries d’Eldorado Gold, dont la production devrait commencer en 2017,pourrait marquer le début d’une nouvelle ère pour la région de Chalcidique, dans lenord de la Grèce. Outre la nouvelle mine à ciel ouvert en cours de développement,des résidus historiques sont de nouveau traités, des terrains à usage industriel sontréhabilités, les exploitations sont reliées les unes aux autres et Hellas Gold, la filialegrecque d’Eldorado, est résolue à faire de la municipalité d’Aristotelis une importanteprovince d’exploitation aurifère. Cependant, la Grèce étant aux prises avec de gravesdifficultés politiques et économiques, chaque pas en avant est effectué avecprécaution.

PAR | PETER BRAUL

Le complexe de Kassandra

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Les résidus sont retraités à la mine d’Olympias

dante de Skouries et d’Olympias rend ces exploitations plusrentables, mais le traitement du minerai d’Olympias à la minede Stratoni, et donc en dehors du village d’Olympiade, est éga-lement motivé par des préoccupations d’ordre environnemen-tal. L’ancienne production à la mine a laissé une empreinteconsidérable et les résidus des activités passées prennent uneplace considérable. Les anciens chantiers de la mine sont encours de réaménagement afin d’être adaptés aux nouvellesactivités, et les résidus font eux aussi l’objet d’un traitement etd’une récupération. L’or restant est en cours d’extraction, cequi génère du matériau de remblai pour les zones exploitées,et les résidus asséchés sont transportés dans un parc à résidusminiers à Stratoni. C’est probablement le seul moyen pour lamunicipalité de rendre au site historique d’Olympias son sta-tut initial sans avoir à en payer la facture ; quant à Eldorado, àdéfaut de récupérer de l’argent sur le retraitement des résidus,elle en tire au moins une certaine crédibilité sociale.

Mais les actionnaires d'Eldorado attendent un rendement deleurs investissements, et la société s'apprête à réaliser une tran-sition majeure en termes d'économie. L'année prochaine, si leprojet se poursuit, la société espère réaliser des bénéfices pourla première fois en Grèce. Le broyeur semi-autogène (broyeurSAG) et le concentrateur de Skouries sont en cours de fabrica-tion, bien que le gouvernement ait récemment révoqué les

adjacente d’argent, de plomb et de zinc Mavres Petres d’Eldo-rado, qui fait partie de l’installation de Stratoni et comprendégalement une usine de traitement et un port, est en activitépratiquement non interrompue depuis le VIe siècle. Lesmineurs ont toujours représenté une fraction importante de lapopulation locale, et aujourd’hui, les projets grecs d’Eldoradoemploient près de 1 700 personnes de cette municipalité d’en-viron 18 000 habitants. À l’heure actuelle, le chômage enGrèce avoisine les 26 %. Bien qu’il nous ramène aux tempsanciens, ce projet concerne davantage la reconstruction de laGrèce en tant que nation moderne.

Un passe-partout métallurgiqueL’ensemble du projet des mines de Cassandre a été

approuvé au titre d’une seule étude d’impact environnemental,ce qui confirme qu’Eldorado a une vision à long terme etambitieuse pour cette région. Stratoni, qui ne produit pas d’or,pourrait sembler ne pas concorder avec le reste des activitésd’Eldorado. Pourtant, le site minier existant est essentiel à lafaçon dont la société développe simultanément ses actifsd’Olympias et de Skouries. « Nous cherchions à créer un seulet unique centre minier », expliquait M. Theodorakopoulos.« Plutôt que d’avoir trois mines, nous souhaitons les relier enun seul complexe. Le lien entre ces sites est le procédé métal-lurgique. »

Ce lien ne sera cependant pas établi du jour au lendemain ;Eldorado pense qu’il lui faudra environ sept ans pour que sesinstallations spécialisées à Stratoni puissent assurer le traite-ment du minerai et du concentré des exploitations d’Olym-pias, de Skouries et de Stratoni.

L’or de la mine Olympias est réfractaire, aussi Eldorado pré-voit de construire une usine utilisant la méthode de fusionéclair à Stratoni qui traitera un mélange de concentrés decuivre et de pyrite à l’aide de cette technologie fournie par lasociété Outotec. La fusion éclair est un procédé qui permet deproduire du cuivre et de l’or en produit dérivé, aussi il requiertnaturellement du cuivre pour fonctionner. Ce cuivre provien-dra du gisement de porphyre cuivre/or de Skouries et de sonconcentrateur associé. Le minerai provenant d’Olympias,quant à lui, sera raffiné afin de générer des concentrés deplomb/d’argent, de zinc et d’or. Le minerai aurifère concentréd’Olympias et le concentré de cuivre de Skouries serontensuite mélangés durant le procédé de fusion éclair. Pourréunir tous ces éléments, il faudra construire un tunnel detransport du minerai de huit kilomètres qui reliera la nouvelleusine aux chantiers souterrains d’Olympias.

Les deux gisements aurifères sont de nature très différentedu point de vue géologique. Le site de Skouries renferme unminerai à teneur relativement élevée pour un corps porphy-rique, avec des réserves de 0,76 grammes par tonne d’or et de0,51 % de cuivre ; le site d’Olympias, quant à lui, recèle unamas minéralisé polymétallique de remplacement des rochescarbonatées bien plus riche. Les réserves y sont de 7,56grammes par tonne, avec 128 grammes par tonne d’argent,5,7 % de zinc et 4,3 % de plomb (des taux qui sont compenséspar la difficulté de traiter l’or réfractaire). La relation codépen-

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L’installation de flottation d’Olympias

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pour détourner les eaux souterraines du corps minéralisé dèsle début de la production dans la mine à ciel ouvert. Parallèle-ment, le développement de l’exploitation souterraine se pour-suivait, laquelle remplacera la production dans la mine à cielouvert environ sept ans après le démarrage des activités.« Nous y arriverons », m’assurait M. Reid.

Skouries sera la première tentative de développement d’unemine d’or à ciel ouvert en Grèce. Le projet a été conçu demanière à minimiser son empreinte, aussi les perturbationstotales en surface ont été limitées à 180 hectares. La sociétéd’experts-conseils SRK Consulting a été contactée afin de déter-miner l’équilibre optimal entre les exploitations à ciel ouvert etsouterraine. M. Theodorakopoulos expliquait que la mineaurait pu être entièrement souterraine, « mais dans ce cas, nousn’aurions pas pu utiliser la mine à ciel ouvert comme zone d’éli-mination des résidus, aussi nous aurions été contraints de déve-lopper un autre parc à résidus miniers et d’occuper environ 700hectares ». Il ajoutait que l’exploitation à ciel ouvert de l’inté-gralité du gisement aurait impliqué d’occuper 1 600 hectares.

Les préparations se poursuivent à Skouries, et Olympias estsoumise à la même pression pour commencer l’exploitation

autorisations pour mener à bien la construction de l'usine ; ladémétallisation préalable se poursuit pour la mine à ciel ouvertet la production devrait commencer en 2017. « À Skouries,30 % de l'or est vierge, aussi avec un circuit de concentrationpar gravité, cet or sera extrait dès le premier jour de la produc-tion », expliquait M. Theodorakopoulos. « Les 70 % d'or res-tants seront mélangés au concentré de cuivre et seront vendusà des fonderies externes les six ou sept premières années. Unefois notre usine métallurgique construite [à Stratoni], jusqu'à30 % du concentré de cuivre produit sera traité conjointementavec le concentré d'Olympias. »

Mode multitâcheEn septembre dernier, lors de ma visite sur le site, le direc-

teur des opérations pour Eldorado en Grèce Britt Reid et sonéquipe d’exploitation étaient aussi sur place ; ils prenaient notedes progrès réalisés et on les sentait impatients de prendre larelève de l’équipe de construction, même s’il leur faudraencore attendre une année. Les bulldozers déplaçaient desmasses de terre pour préparer les installations de gestion desrésidus et une équipe installait des puits perdus et d’injection


profil de projet | L E S M I N E S K A S S A N D R A

Le minerai du site d’Olympias sera transporté par l’intermédiaire d’un tunnel de huit kilomètres pour être traité à Stratoni

OLYMPIAS • Produits : concentrés de plomb/argent, zinc et or

• Méthode d’exploitation minière : percement de galeries et remblayage

• Durée de vie estimée de la mine : 25 ans

STRATONI• Produits : plomb/zinc/argent du corps

minéralisé de Mavres Petres


• Comprend : installation de gestion des résidus,laboratoire, concentrateur, port

SKOURIES• Produits : concentré d’or/de cuivre

et lingots d’argent aurifère

• Méthode d’exploitation minière : exploitationà ciel ouvert et par sous-niveaux abattus


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négligeable à une époque aussi noire pour la Grèce sur le planéconomique.

Eldorado fait de son mieux pour établir de bonnes relationset faire preuve d’une hospitalité à la grecque. La culture localeimplique de longues pauses-café afin de répondre aux exi-gences sociales, et personne ne prend son déjeuner sans com-pagnie. Mais imposer des techniques minières modernes dansune économie principalement axée sur le tourisme n’est passimple. « Changer les mœurs et l’état d’esprit prend du temps,de la patience et une bonne dose de dialogue », expliquaitEduardo Moura, vice-président d’Eldorado et directeur généraldes exploitations en Grèce. Afin de familiariser les habitants dela région à ses activités et de leur montrer son engagementenvers l’environnement, la société aurifère a accueilli plus de4 000 personnes sur ses sites de Chalcidique l’année dernière.Les étudiants arrivent par autocars entiers, et Kostas Georgant-zis, directeur des RP de la société, m’affirmait que la société aconstaté une amélioration notable du sentiment public.Cependant, la société mène un combat de longue haleine.

En ce moment, la forte tension imposée sur les exploita-tions d’Eldorado semble provenir de la situation chaotique quiaffecte Athènes plutôt que des protestations locales. Les divi-sions politiques dans le pays font maintenant l’objet d’un élanpassionnel, voire violent, qu’il est difficile de concilier avec laréputation de cette nation comme berceau de la démocratie.

Dans la municipalité d’Aristotelis, cependant, on espèreque les choses se tassent à mesure que les bénéfices des projetsd’Eldorado commencent à se faire sentir dans les communau-tés environnantes. « Le slogan électoral de notre nouveaumaire était “ Œuvrons à réunifier la région “ », indiquaitM. Theodorakopoulos, ajoutant que les groupes qui étaientauparavant contre l’exploitation minière se sont ralliés à cenouveau chef de file et sont prêts à découvrir les activité de lasociété. C’est peut-être de cette manière, pas à pas, qu’un paysse reconstruit. ICM

minière l’année prochaine. Ennovembre, Konstantinos Markogian-nis, directeur de l’usine à Olympias,commencera à moderniser son équipe-ment afin de traiter l’alimentation de lamine une fois que tous les résidus his-toriques auront été de nouveau traités.« Nous arrêterons nos activités pendantsix mois afin d’installer les nouveauxéquipements et de modifier l’usine »,déclarait-il, ajoutant que selon ses esti-mations, la production pourrait com-mencer à la mine en mai l’annéeprochaine. Son équipe est bien habi-tuée aux changements ; en effet, elle atout d’abord dû remettre l’usine en étatafin de pouvoir traiter les résidus, et ausein même de ce procédé, y apporterde légères modifications chaque mois.Par exemple, les schlamms fins trouvésdans les anciens résidus ont posé un problème d’exhaure pourles filtres à disques. « Si le concentré est inférieur à 20grammes par tonne, la matière n’est pas vendable, et les péna-lités sont très élevées », expliquait M. Markogiannis.

Les filtres-presses feront également partie des projets deM. Markogiannis pour le minerai brut. Jusqu’à ce que l’entre-prise de forage Aktor ait fini le tunnel menant à Stratoni, lesrésidus fins asséchés seront envoyés par camion au parc à rési-dus miniers de Stratoni et les résidus grossiers serviront deremblais miniers cimentés ; en outre, de nouveaux filtres-presses seront ajoutés de manière à assurer le maintien de lacapacité du concentrateur d’Olympias de 400 000 tonnes paran au maximum.

Joel Rheault, directeur général de la mine d’Olympias, sur-veille le développement des ressources inexploitées à Olym-pias ainsi que l’élargissement et l’élévation des anciennesgaleries qui pourraient encore servir. M. Rheault, originaired’Atikokan, en Ontario, a emménagé près de Thessaloniqueavec sa femme et ses trois enfants. Il est peu probable qu’il seretrouve au chômage. « Il y a encore tant à faire », expliquait-il, le regard heureux alors qu’il étudiait le plan de la mine. L’ex-ploitation minière menée auparavant n’avait permis d’atteindreque la partie supérieure d’un corps minéralisé et avait laissé decôté un second gisement situé à une centaine de mètres à l’est.M. Rheault et son équipe espèrent y arriver bientôt. « La des-cenderie est ouvrira plusieurs galeries d’avancement qui nouspermettront de commencer à nous rapprocher du corps miné-ralisé [à l’est]. »

Théâtre politique à la grecque Au vu du travail considérable accompli dans les exploita-

tions d’Eldorado, il est difficile d’accepter les tentatives d’inti-midation du gouvernement grec (p. 109). D’après Eldorado,les mines généreront plus de 5 000 emplois directs et indirectsune fois qu’elles seront en pleine production, ce qui n’est pas

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L’équipe de développement au travaildans le tunnel de transport du mineraidu côté du site d’Olympias

An Introduction to Cutoff Grade: Theory and Practice in Open Pit and Underground Mines (with a new section on blending optimization strategy)Cutoff grades are essential in determining the economic feasibility and mine life of a project. Learn how to solve most cutoff grade estimationproblems by developing techniques and graphical analytical methods, about the relationship between cutoff grades and the design of pushbacks inopen pit mines, and the optimization of block sizes in caving methods.INSTRUCTOR Jean-Michel Rendu, USA • DATE September 9-11, 2015 • LOCATION Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Geostatistical Mineral Resource Estimation and Meeting the New Regulatory Environment: Step by Step from Sampling to Grade ControlLearn about the latest regulations on public reporting of resources/reserves through state-of-the-art statistical and geostatistical techniques; howto apply geostatistics to predict dilution and adapt reserve estimates to that predicted dilution; how geostatistics can help you categorize yourresources in an objective manner; and how to understand principles of NI 43-101 and the SME Guide.INSTRUCTORS Marcelo Godoy, Newmont Mining Corp., Denver; Jean-Michel Rendu, JMR Consultants, USA; Roussos Dimitrakopoulos, McGillUniversity, Canada; and Guy Desharnais, SGS Canada Inc., Canada • DATE September 14-18, 2015 • LOCATION Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Strategic Risk Management in Mine Design and Production Scheduling: Generating Optimal Mine Plans Given Uncertainty• Find out how to manage and minimise risks and produce optimal pit designs with strategic mine planning processes and the next generation

optimisation methods. • Discover how new developments will help you capture the “upside potential” in mine designs and minimise “downside risks” as well as increase

cash flows through the effect of the mining sequence and “risk blending”.• Explore real-world examples and participate in hands-on computer sessions that show how to increase project value by employing new risk-

based (stochastic) optimisation models.• Understand and learn about the new stochastic mine planning optimisation framework and its contribution to sustainable utilisation of mineral

resources.• Discover new developments in optimizing mining complexes and mineral value chains.INSTRUCTORS Matt LaBonte, Minemax, Denver, USA; and Roussos Dimitrakopoulos, McGill University, Canada • DATE September 21-23, 2015• LOCATION Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Contributing to community sustainability during mineral exploration: Lessons learned from MesoamericaJ. M. Ríos and I. Thomson, On Common Ground Consultants Inc., Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

International law norms of consultation with Indigenous communities: Significance for corporate stakeholdersD. Newman, College of Law, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada

ABSTRACT This paper discusses the author’s work on inter-national law norms of consultation with Indigenouscommunities and examines unexpected corporate stake-holder impacts on these norms. Customary internationallaw, which governs the area, does not traditionally refer tocorporate conduct. This paper surveys several sources ondeveloping international law on consultation obligations; italso discusses the impacts these norms can have on corpo-rate stakeholders in the mining industry. Finally, it askshow interactions of corporate stakeholders in this area canindirectly impact future law and suggests implications fordifferent business models in the mining sector.

RÉSUMÉ Le présent article traite du travail de l’auteur sur lesnormes de consultation avec les communautés autochtones conte-nues dans le droit international et examine les impacts inattendusdes parties prenantes sur ces normes. Le droit coutumier internatio-nal, qui gouverne ce domaine, ne réfère traditionnellement pas à laconduite des sociétés. L’article analyse plusieurs sources traitant dudéveloppement de nouvelles lois internationales sur l’obligation deconsulter ; il traite aussi des impacts que ces normes peuvent avoirsur les parties prenantes dans l’industrie minière. Finalement, il posela question à savoir comment les interactions des parties prenantesdans ce domaine peuvent avoir un impact indirect sur les loisfutures et il suggère des implications pour divers modèles d’affairesdans le secteur minier.

ABSTRACT Without conscious effort and understanding, anumber of factors unique to mineral exploration often hin-der building sustainability in host communities. Theseinclude the episodic and transitory presence of an explo-ration team in the community and the inherent uncertaintyof outcomes—most projects fail from an exploration per-spective. Experience in rural communities acrossMesoamerica, however, has shown that it is possible to gobeyond pragmatic philanthropy and infrastructureimprovements to promote positive, sustainable outcomesin communities. Examples are provided of lessons learnedand proven practices that improve quality of life and sup-port a strong social license to operate.

RÉSUMÉ Sans une compréhension et un effort réfléchis, de nom-breux facteurs uniques à l’exploration minérale nuisent souvent àl’établissement d’un développement durable dans les communau-tés d’accueil. Ces facteurs comprennent la présence épisodique ettransitoire d’une équipe d’exploration dans la communauté et l’in-certitude inhérente des résultats – la plupart des projets échouentaprès l’étape de l’exploration. L’expérience dans les communautésrurales à travers la Méso-Amérique a toutefois démontré qu’il estpossible de dépasser la philanthropie pragmatique et les améliora-tions des infrastructures pour promouvoir des résultats positifs etdurables dans les communautés. Des exemples qui améliorent laqualité de vie et soutiennent un solide permis social d’exploitationsont présentés ; ils sont tirés de leçons apprises et de pratiqueséprouvées.

May/Mai 2015 | 113

Excerpts taken from abstracts in CIM Journal, Vol. 6, No. 2.To subscribe, to submit a paper or to be a peer reviewer—www.cim.org

T E C H N I C A L A B S T R AC T S

CIM journal

Noise and vibration: Mine workers’ exposure in Quebec underground minesM. Laflamme, Université Laval, Quebec City, Quebec, Canada; P. Marcotte and J. Boutin, Institut de recherche Robert-Sauvé en santé et en sécuritédu travail, Montreal, Quebec, Canada; and S. Ouellette and G. LeBlanc, Natural Resources Canada, CanmetMINING, Val-d’Or, Quebec, Canada

ABSTRACT To characterize noise and vibration sources ofdifferent types of mining equipment used in undergroundmining, the authors performed a study in eight Quebecmines on 28 pieces of equipment. This paper presents theprocedure followed to select the equipment to be evaluatedand the low-cost acquisition system developed to performmultichannel time-domain data acquisition in harsh envi-ronments. It also presents the results obtained for the noiselevel produced by the equipment and for hand-arm andwhole-body vibration exposures.

RÉSUMÉ Dans le but de caractériser les sources de bruits et devibrations de divers équipements miniers utilisés sous terre, lesauteurs ont étudié 28 équipements dans huit mines du Québec.L’article présente la procédure suivie pour choisir les équipements àévaluer ainsi qu’un système multicanal à faible coût développé pouracquérir des données dans des environnements difficiles. Il présenteaussi les résultats obtenus pour les niveaux de bruit produit par leséquipements et pour les expositions main-bras et du corps entieraux vibrations.


Multivariate data cleaning and reclassification of particle size distribution data for the Joslyn leaseP. Babak, PennWest Exploration, Calgary, Alberta, Canada; P. Henriquel and E. Insalaco, Total E&P Canada Ltd., Calgary, Alberta, Canada; and O. Babak, Cenovus Energy, Calgary, Alberta, Canada

ABSTRACT Detection of outliers is an important primarystep in geomodelling. Geological datasets often containerrors due to problems such as measurement device limi-tations and recording glitches. In this paper, a robustMahalanobis distance-based approach is successfullyapplied to particle-size distributions of the Joslyn lease, anoil sands development site near Fort McMurray, Alberta,Canada. Automatic outlier detection and geological reviewwere combined. Outliers from the Mahalanobis distanceapproach were compared with their respective core photo-graphs to determine if laboratory measurements and faciesclassification were correct. A checking procedure for labo-ratory technicians is proposed.

RÉSUMÉ La détection des valeurs aberrantes constitue une étapeprimaire importante de la modélisation géologique. Les ensem-bles de données géologiques contiennent souvent des erreurs enraison de problèmes tels que les limitations des instruments demesure et des pépins d’enregistrement. Dans le présent article,une méthode robuste basée sur la distance de Mahalanobis a étémise en oeuvre avec succès aux granulométries du bail minierJoslyn, un site de sables bitumineux en développement à proxi -mité de Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada. La détection automatiquedes valeurs aberrantes a été combinée à une étude géologique.Les valeurs aberrantes de la méthode de la distance de Manalanobis ont été comparées avec leurs photographies respec-tives de carottes de forage afin de déterminer si les mesures enlaboratoire et la classification des faciès étaient correctes. Une procé-dure de vérification pour les techniciens de laboratoire est proposée.


CIM journal


Towards a practical stope reconciliation process in large-scale bulk underground stoping operations, Olympic Dam,South AustraliaY. Potvin, Australian Centre for Geomechanics, Nedlands, Australia; and D. Grant and G. Mungur, BHP Billiton Olympic Dam, Adelaide, Australia

ABSTRACT This paper deals with the reconciliation of openstope performance at Olympic Dam, South Australia, witha focus on stope stability, recovery, and operational aspectsof stope reconciliation in relation to the expected orplanned stope design. The observed stope performance isinconsistent with the equivalent linear overbreak sloughingcriteria for assessing the performance of large open stopes.The aim is to investigate new stope performance criteriausing quantitative (overbreak, underbreak, maximumdepth of wall failure) and qualitative (stope productivity,observed fragmentation) information that correlates withthe observed stope behaviour, providing a process forimproving future stope designs.

RÉSUMÉ Le présent article traite de la réconciliation de la perfor-mance des chambres ouvertes à Olympic Dam, Australie du Sud, enciblant la stabilité des chambres, la récupération et les aspects opé-rationnels de la réconciliation des chambres par rapport à laconception attendue ou planifiée des chambres. La performanceobservée des chambres ne concorde pas avec les critères d’épais-seur équivalente du bris hors profil pour évaluer la performance degrandes chambres ouvertes. L’objectif est d’étudier de nouveaux cri-tères de performance des chambres au moyen de donnéesquantitatives (rupture hors profil, rupture à l’intérieur du profil plani-fié, profondeur maximale d’effondrement du mur) et qualitatives(productivité des chambres, fragmentation observée) qui concor-dent avec le comportement observé de la chambre, fournissant ainsiun processus pour améliorer les futures conceptions des chambres.

Modelling heavy-tailed coarse gold deposits with a spatial point processC. R. Mooney, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Markin/CNRL Natural Resources Engineering Facility, University of Alberta,Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; W. Board, Pretium Resources Inc., Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada; and J. B. Boisvert, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Markin/CNRL Natural Resources Engineering Facility, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

ABSTRACT Traditional geostatistical modelling methods aredifficult to apply to heavy-tailed deposits because theextreme positive skew of the grade distribution leads tobias. The focus here is on an innovative method of model-ling the high-grade population by conditionally simulatingdiscrete volumes (nuggets) of gold with marked Poissonand Cox processes. Capping and other ad-hoc manipula-tion of the assay data is not required; however, an intensitymap for the point processes is required. The method isdemonstrated on a dataset from an epithermal deposit anddemonstrates an improvement in reducing smearing andcontrolling the skew of the grade distribution.

RÉSUMÉ Les méthodes traditionnelles de modélisation géostatis-tique sont difficiles à appliquer dans des gisements dont ladistribution de la teneur est à queue lourde car l’extrême asymétriepositive de la distribution de la teneur génère des biais. Dans le pré-sent article, l’accent est mis sur une méthode novatrice demodélisation de la population à haute teneur par la simulationconditionnelle des volumes discrets d’or (pépites) au moyen deprocédés marqués de Poisson et de Cox. La limite d’utilisation etd’autres manipulations ad hoc des données ne sont pas requises ;toutefois, il faut une carte des intensités pour le processus ponctuel.La méthode est démontrée sur un ensemble de données d’essaisprovenant d’un gisement épithermal et elle montre une améliora-tion dans le lissage du flou et dans le contrôle de l’asymétrie de ladistribution de la teneur.

May/Mai 2015 | 115



CIM journal

Le diagramme ternaire Al2O3-Sr-Y : un nouvel outil pour l’exploration de gisements de sulfures massifs volcanogènesM. Proulx, Géo-Consilium, Val-d’Or, Québec, Canada

ABSTRACT The tertiary diagram Al2O3-Sr-Y is a new tool toexplore Archean volcanogenic massive sulphide (VMS)deposits. The diagram can be used to discriminate betweenthe volcanic rocks where zinc is the dominant mineraliza-tion (Zn+ domain) and the rocks where copper is thedominant mineralization (Cu+ domain), as well as the vol-canic rocks that were subjected to hydrothermalchloritization that could have led to the formation of chlo-ritites associated with alteration chimneys (Cl+ domain).These three domains define the zones of geochemical influ-ence, or residual or fossil hydrothermal footprintsproduced by hydrothermal convection cells generated bymagmas. Exploration companies can apply the diagram todetermine, at low cost, the potential fertility of the Archeanvolcanic rocks by using their databases and the results oftheir field analyses, without any data manipulation. Thediagram does not apply to gold-bearing VMS deposits.

RÉSUMÉ Le diagramme ternaire Al2O3-Sr-Y est un nouvel outil ser-vant à l’exploration de gisements de sulfures massifs volcanogènes(SMV) archéens. Le diagramme permet de discriminer entre lesroches volcaniques à minéralisations à zinc dominant (domaineZn+) et celles à minéralisations à cuivre dominant (domaine Cu+),ainsi que les roches volcaniques ayant subi une chloritisation hydro-thermale pouvant aboutir à la formation de chloritites associées auxcheminées d’altération (domaine Cl+). Ces trois domaines délimitentdes zones d’influence géochimique ou d’empreintes hydrother-males résiduelles ou fossiles produites par les cellules de convectionhydrothermales générées par des magmas. Le diagramme permetaux sociétés d’exploration de déterminer de façon peu coûteuse lafertilité potentielle des roches volcaniques archéennes en ayantrecours à leurs bases de données et aux résultats de leurs analysesde terrain, sans aucune manipulation des données. Le diagramme nes’applique pas aux SMV aurifères.

Excerpts taken from abstracts in CMQ, Vol. 53, No. 1.To subscribe – www.cmq-online.ca


canadian metallurgical quarterly


Comparative study on simultaneous leaching of nutrients during bioleaching of heavy metals from sewage sludgeusing indigenous iron and sulphur oxidising microorganismsA. Pathak, Mineral Resource Research Division, Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources, Daejeon, Korea; P. Singh, Centre for EnergyStudies, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, Hauz Khas, New Delhi, India; P. Dhama, Ajay Kumar Garg Engineering College, Ghaziabad, India; M. G. Dastidar, Centre for Energy Studies, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, Hauz Khas, New Delhi, India; D. J. Kim, Mineral Resource ResearchDivision, Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources, Daejeon, Korea; and G. Heyes, CSIRO, Process Science and Engineering, ClaytonSouth, Australia

ABSTRACT The present study investigated the changes innutrient profile of sewage sludge during bioleaching in abatch mode of operation. The study identified the optimumbioleaching period at which maximum solubilisation ofmetals is achieved while maintaining the fertilising propertyof the bioleached sludge. The bioleaching experiments wereperformed using anaerobically digested sewage sludge byemploying indigenous iron and sulphur oxidising microor-ganisms. The results showed that bioleaching using sulphuroxidising microorganisms is comparatively advantageousdue to the higher solubilisation of heavy metals. However,despite its high potential in solubilisation of heavy metalsfrom the sludge, the bioleaching process resulted in theundesirable dissolution/loss of sludge bound nutrients(nitrogen and phosphorus), thus making the sludge lessattractive for land application as a fertiliser. After 16 days ofbioleaching about 45% of the nitrogen and 34% of thephosphorus were leached from the sludge using indigenousiron oxidising microorganisms, whereas about 78% of thenitrogen and 56% of the phosphorus were leached usingindigenous sulphur oxidising microorganisms. The find-ings indicated that the fertilising property of the sewagesludge can be maintained by conducting the process for ashorter duration of time (up to 10 days). The optimumbioleaching period was 10 days where about 85%Cu,71%Ni, 91%Zn and 61%Cr were solubilised from thesludge while the loss of nitrogen and phosphorus was only56 and 51% respectively, by using sulphur oxidisingmicroorganisms. The heavy metals remaining in thebioleached sludge were mostly in the residual fractionensuring the safe disposal of bioleached sludge for landapplication as a fertiliser.

RÉSUMÉ Cette étude examine les changements du profil de nutri-ment de boues d’épuration lors de la biolixiviation d’un procédédiscontinu. L’étude identifie la durée optimale de biolixiviation àlaquelle la solubilisation maximale des métaux est achevée tout enmaintenant les propriétés fertilisantes de la boue biolixiviée. On aeffectué les expériences de biolixiviation en utilisant des bouesd’épuration digérées en condition anaérobique et en employantl’oxydation par ferro- ou thiomicroorganismes indigènes. Les résul-tats ont montré que la biolixiviation par oxydation avec desthiomicroorganismes était comparativement avantageuse grâce à lasolubilisation plus élevée des métaux lourds. Cependant, en dépit deson potentiel élevé de solubilisation des métaux lourds de la boue,le procédé de biolixiviation avait pour résultat une dissolution ouune perte indésirables des nutriments liés dans la boue (azote etphosphore), rendant ainsi la boue moins attrayante pour applicationdans les champs comme engrais. Après 16 jours de biolixiviation,environ 45 % de l’azote et 34 % du phosphore étaient lixiviés de laboue par oxydation avec des ferromicroorganismes indigènes, alorsqu’environ 78 % de l’azote et 56 % du phosphore étaient lixiviés enutilisant des thiomicroorganismes indigènes. Les constatations indi-quent qu’on peut maintenir les propriétés fertilisantes de la boued’épuration en effectuant le processus sur une durée plus courte(jusqu’à 10 jours). La période optimale de biolixiviation était de 10jours, pendant lesquels environ 85 % du Cu, 71 % du Ni, 91 % du Znet 61 % du Cr étaient solubilisés à partir de la boue alors que lespertes d’azote et de phosphore étaient seulement de 56 % et de51%, respectivement, en utilisant les thiomicroorganismes. Lesmétaux lourds qui restaient dans la boue biolixiviée se trouvaientprincipalement dans la fraction résiduelle, assurant la dispositionsécuritaire comme engrais de la boue biolixiviée.


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BELLEDUNE PORT AUTHORITYSituated on the Bay of Chaleur in northeastern New Brunswick, the port facilities arelocated in a rural area with no congestion. Belledune has an artificial harbor equipped witha breakwater, 4 terminals and 6 berths. The port has multi-type cargo facilities, includingone of the most modern roll on- roll off and general cargo terminals in Atlantic Canada.Approximately 2 million metric tonnes of bulk, breakbulk and project cargo flow throughthe port every year. Since 2009 over $80 million in infrastructure improvements weremade, including a new roll on-roll off/barge terminal, 27 acres of storage adjacent to theterminals and a new Modular Component Fabrication Facility. The Fabrication Facility hasa 19.8 meter clear height and is equipped with two 20 tonne overhead cranes, 20 weld-ing stations and is located along a straight 1.6km route from the port terminals. This indus-trial zoned site provides unlimited possibilities for fabrication, metal working, assembly,and storage allowing you to save time and money at eastern Canada’s mining port.

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May/Mai 2015 | 119

professional directory | innovation showcase | ad index

66 A.L. Sims & Son Ltd. 3 Allied Construction Products

LLC 28 AMC Consultants 16 AMEC Foster Wheeler 52 American Peat Technology 66 Atlantic Industries 85 Breaker Technology 9 Caterpillar 30 Conspec Controls 17 Cummins Inc. 23 DMC Mining Services 35 DRA Taggart 4 Dumas Mining 38 Dux Machinery 29 Emerson 21 Endress+Hauser 15 Eriez Manufacturing Co. 41 FWS Group of Companies 33 Glencore Technology 24 Goldcorp 40 Golder Associates Ltd. 47 Greatario Engineered Storage

Systems

25 Hatch 26 Hewitt Equipment OBC HLS Hard-Line Solutions 13 Imperial Oil 19 Independent Mining

Consultants 37 J.H. Fletcher & Co. 49 Joy Global Underground

Mining Group 28 Knight Piesold 39 Les Industries Fournier Inc. 57 Luff Industries IFC Mammoet 11 Maptek 27 McLanahan 43 Mecanicad 67 Metso 76 Orica 61 PearTree Financial 53 Pentair Flow Technologies 59 Petro-Canada Lubricants 44 Polydeck Screen Corporation 81 RDH Mining Equipment 55 Redpath Group

82 Rogers Electric Motor Service 20 Rousseau Metal Inc. 36 Rulmeca Canada Limited 45 Sandvik 51 Sherwin Williams Protective

& Marine IBC SMS Equipment Inc. 56 SNC-Lavalin 83 SSAB 91 Stantec 58 Technosub 7 Telsmith, Inc. 31 Tsubaki of Canada Limited 18 Valard Construction 68 Wajax Industries 42 Westeel 75 Xylem Water Solutions Inc.118-119 Innovation Showcase Belledune Port Freeport-McMoRan Inc. Movex Innovations Sandvik 119 Professional Directory KBL Environmental

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TRAVEL

Stratoni, GreeceBy Peter Braul

about 100 metres offthe main road. Lookfor it next to a smallfarm with a singleblack horse and a safeof Muscovy ducks.

Next door PensionK a r v o u n o s k a l a(~$70/night) offerssimilar amenities butis a step up in termsof landscaping, withpalm trees in the yardand a view of the sea.Being a bit closer tothe water, here you’resoothed to sleep bythe sound of waves.

On the shores of the Aegean Sea in northeastern Greece, Stratoni is home toHellas Gold’s headquarters, from which operations are based for its Olympias,Skouries and Stratoni projects. A good number of the company’s employees

live in the picturesque town of 1,200 where not much can be said to be “happening,”though it is unlikely you would want that to change. Not many mining towns arethis pleasant to visit.

WHERE TO STAY

Learn the Greek alphabetif you can. Many wordsare easily recognizable

once you crack the code,and reading local signs

(however slowly) makesyou feel smart.

TIP

centre of town to thenorth and a secludedbeach to the south.The building is a bithard to find as it is

sometimes withoutthe breakfast). Unlikein Canada, these areusually purpose-builtto house tourists, anda family will com-monly earn a solidchunk of theirincome bookingrooms.

Musses Pension(~$40/night) featuresgood clean rooms,ever-important airconditioning, Wi-Fithat works most ofthe time, and is ashort walk both to the

“pension,” the Greekequivalent of a bedand breakfast (except

You won’t find chainhotels in Stratoni.Opt instead for a

Many Greeks don’t eatmuch during the day;they save up room togorge on mezes (theGreek version oftapas) later in theevening. Canadiansmay find this eatingschedule uncomfort-able, and locals areunlikely to realizewhen you’re about to

faint in the middle ofa meeting. Be pre-pared and bringsnacks to get youthrough the day.

In the morning, hitthe local bakery andstock up on spanako-pita: a highly portablesnack that’s easy tokeep on hand during

long days. Spinach andcheese are far from theonly offerings. Thereare all manner of pas-tries stuffed with fruits,cheese and meat so it isbest to ask what’sinside or you might be surprised withketchup instead ofstrawberry jam.

If you’re lucky andyour Greek colleaguesstop for lunch, you’llprobably be in for asouvlaki: fresh pitabread stuffed with allthe usual fixings you’dfind in Canada plusfries. For supper,head to a taverna suchas Stratoni’s Apaggio(on the road besidethe beach) for mezes.

It’s best to order as agroup and taste a bitof everything: friedzucchini, grilled octo-pus, steamed dande-lion, mussels andlocal sausages shouldget you started. Ifdrinking anise-infused ouzo isn’t foryou, order a bottle ofAssyrtiko, a white

wine made from aunique Greek grapevariety that has arefreshing acidity andpairs well with all thegrilled fish likely to beon order as well.

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The ancient city ofStagira, where Aris-totle was born, is a15-minute driveinland. It is consid-ered the most impor-tant historic site inChalkidiki, the regionwhere Stratoni islocated. Excavationbegan here in the1960s and, like mostGreek historic sites,continues today, withevidence of the coun-try’s rich historyborne out in theuncovered stone.You’ll want to give

yourself at least a fewhours to soak thisplace in and let yourimagination piecetogether what life waslike here several mil-lennia ago. Don’t letthe elements upsetyour idyll; be sure tobring proper foot -wear, snacks andwater. Many of theimportant artefactsthat have been foundare preserved at theA r c h a e o l o g i c a lMuseum of Polygy-ros, which is anotherhour west and alsoworth the trip.

If you have a fewdays, the most inter-esting of Chalkidiki’sthree large peninsulasis Athos, governed asan autonomousmonastic state andhome to 20 monaster-ies. To get to themonasteries, whereyou can spend thenight, board a ferryfrom Ierissos just 20minutes from Stra-toni, or Ouranoupolia little further downthe road. Unfortu-

hand to get yourpaperwork in order.If, for obvious rea-sons, you don’t standa pilgrim’s chance of

The only place to withdraw euros is the ATM next to the mining company’s offices,

and many businesses only accept cash.

TIP

WHERE TO EXPLORE

A LITTLE HISTORYMining in the area surrounding the towndates back to well over 2,000 years ago, andsettlements have always primarily served themine workers. The Stratoni we know todaywas settled in the 19th century, but sufferedextensive damage from an earthquake in1932 and was almost entirely reconstructed.

Greeks consider summerto be over after August,

so beaches and theirtourist infrastructure can

feel a bit deserted asSeptember rolls around.But if you like to avoid

crowds, the weather stayshotter than most of theCanadian summer andthe Aegean doesn’t cool

off quickly.

TIP

nately the destinationis off-limits to half ofpotential visitors: ac -cess is restricted tomen and you need theproper parts and per-mits. Contact the Pilgrims’ Bureau inThes saloniki before-

If you are working forHellas Gold or parent

company Eldorado Gold,don’t wear your companycolours while traveling to

Ierissos, whereresentment towards

mining lingers.

TIP

May/Mai 2015 | 121

visiting, play it safeand enjoy the view ofthe often snow-capped Mount Athosfrom a nearby beach.

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On an ordinary Sunday morning inthe southern area of present-dayQuebec in 1846, 20-year-old

Clothilde Gilbert was sent out to the fieldsby her father to find one of their horses sothey could ride to mass. Clothilde wascrossing the shallow, sandy river later knownas the Gilbert River when she noticed a shiny,yellow rock about the size of a pigeon egg. Itturned out to be a 2.5-ounce gold nugget.

Looking back years later, Clothildesaid, “I never thought that such a pebblewould make so much noise afterwards.”And a lot of noise it made.

Five decades before thousands con-verged on the Klondike, the region ofBeauce in today’s province of Quebecbecame the site of Canada’s first gold rush, producing two of thelargest nuggets ever found in the country.

This was also a period of change for local mining law. At thetime of Clothilde’s discovery, some land tenure in the Provinceof Canada was still under the seigneurial system originally estab-lished in New France in 1627, in which the king granted largetracts of land to members of the bourgeoisie, important familiesor former military officers. These proprietors would then grantparcels of land to tenant families. Clothilde’s family was one ofthese tenants, living on the Rigaud Vaudreuil seigneury underCharles-Joseph Chaussegros de Léry.

Chaussegros de Léry took an immediate interest inClothilde’s discovery, securing exclusive and perpetual licence toall mining on his vast property, which covered about 143 squarekilometres. Under the agreement, he was granted 25 per cent ofall mining revenue on top of a 10 per cent royalty to the state.

Although that did not leave much for individual local miners– mainly untrained labourers who obtained rights to pan sec-tions of the rivers on Chaussegros de Léry’s land – they foundcreative ways around the heavy royalties. Technically, the royal-ties only applied to revenue from smelted gold, so many soldtheir gold unrefined. Others went so far as to challenge theterms of Chaussegros de Léry’s licence in court.

Meanwhile, Chaussegros de Léry made an early attempt toexploit the resources on his property. In 1847 he leased hisrights to the Chaudière Mining Company, a subsidiary of theHudson’s Bay Company, and the first gold company in theProvince of Canada. Despite early optimism, mining activity inthe area remained relatively small and stifled by both the heavyroyalties and relatively minimal profits.

In 1854 the seigneurial system was abolished, opening thedoor to a democratization of land ownership. However, the large


landowners maintained control over theirland, and Chaussegros de Léry held on tohis 25 per cent royalty.

And then one day everything changed.In 1863, two brothers named Joseph andFéréol Poulin, and a man named RodrigueNarcisse – all farmers from Saint-François-de-Beauce – panned 72 ounces of gold injust two hours at a site on the ChaudièreRiver, which also ran through Chaussegrosde Léry’s land.

Just like that, gold fever spiked again.People came to the area from across theUnited States and Europe, and nearbySaint-François-de-Beauce became a boom-town that would eventually be known asthe “Eldorado of Canada.” A railway line

was even built through the town and connected the region tothe industrial and transportation hubs further north, whichbrought more eager gold-seekers.

In 1866, two of Canada’s largest gold nuggets were discov-ered on the Gilbert River: a 52-ounce nugget found by RobertKilgour and a 46-ounce nugget found by Archibald McDonald.In 1877, 10 years after Canadian Confederation, the Boisson-neau brothers located a 42-ounce nugget. In total, an estimated1.5 to three tons of gold came out of the Beauce region duringthe gold rush, half of it from the Gilbert River.

Business was booming, and yet resentment over high royal-ties remained. The Poulin brothers famously avoided payingroyalties on $7,550 worth of gold by smuggling it out of thejurisdiction in tea cups. Legal disputes began piling up overmineral rights, which were still controlled by the Chaussegrosde Léry family.

Then in 1880, the recently formed province of Quebecpassed its Mining Act, which provided much-needed regulationand gave the province control over all subsurface mineral rights.But even so, concessions were made to landowners who hadobtained mineral rights prior to the act coming into force, and aSuperior Court ruling in 1883 upheld the Chaussegros de Léryfamily’s mineral rights. This decision meant that royalties in theBeauce would remain high, and with the easy gold already goneand other regions opening up, investors and miners simplywent elsewhere.

Even though changes to mining law in Quebec came too latefor miners in the Beauce to fully develop subsurface resources,they succeeded in opening up other regions in the province toexploration such as Abitibi-Témiscamingue and Rouyn-Noranda. A new chapter for mining activity in Canada hadbegun. CIM

Quebec’s Gold RushBy Correy Baldwin

Clothilde Gilbert found a 2.5-ounce gold nugget in1846 in today’s Gilbert River, which kicked off agold rush to the area.

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PC800042 m3

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cim magazine may 2015

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