400 MW366.4 MW

0.63 MW895 MW294 MW0.19 MW

203.56 MW0.4 MW

38,400 MW2,858.8 MW

0.4 MW8,500 MW3,489.4 MW

1,823 MW

5,000 MW258.4 MW

0.4 MW

900 MW198.4 MW

3.5 MW

900 MW1,471.1 MW

6.4 MW

13,800 MW488.7 MW

2.8 MW

0.8 MW100 MW

0.03 MW

9.2 MW60 MW

0.3 MW0.04 MW

6,800 MW54.7 MW

0.035 MW

Hydropower Wind Solar

Taking a shine to solarCanada has been slow to advance solar energy development. The rest of the world has not.

Fossil fuels make the world go round, at least when it comes to electricity generation. But fossil fuels also emit carbon dioxide, and our growing use of them is contributing greatly to global warming. Non-emitting renewable energy is viewed as the best hope to curb our emissions crisis. Yet how much progress is Canada, and the rest of the world, really making in going green?

Gang Green

Sources: Canadian Hydropower Association 2014-2015 annual report; Canadian Wind Energy Association; Canadian Solar Industries Association

Cleaning upHydropower is king when it comes to renewable energy capacity in Canada. However, wind energy is growing across the country. As for solar, Ontario is the only jurisdiction that’s embraced this energy source.

Installed capacity of hydro, wind and solar energy across Canada

Global investment in renewable energyby sector – 2014 (excludes large-scale hydro)

Renewables as a percentage of global power generation (excludes large-scale hydro)

Capital gainsCanada can’t match China and the U.S. when it comes to investment in renewable energy, but gobs of cash are still being sunk into green energy in the Great White North.

Slow advanceRenewable energy still accounts for a small percentage of the world’s power mix. However, its market share is slowly growing.

Solar$149.6 billion

Wind$89.3 billion

Biomass & w-t-e$9.3 billion*

Biofuels$5.5 billion

Small hydro$5.5 billion

Marine$0.2 billion

w-t-e = waste-to-energySource: Bloomberg Global Trends in Energy Investment 2015

Geothermal$2.2 billion

New investment in renewable energy by country – 2014(excludes large-scale hydro)

$34.3B

$7.4B$8B

$81B

$11.4B $7.1B $5.5B$13.9B

$36.3B

$6.4B

Source: Bloomberg Global Trends in Energy Investment 2015

Source: Bloomberg Global Trends in Energy Investment 2015

4

6

8

10

2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014

5.2% 5.3% 5.9% 6.1% 6.9% 7.8% 8.5% 9.1%

Online extras: naturalresourcesmagazine.com NR43

Call it the “poison well” effect, but New Brunswick’s well-documented, almost existential, struggle with hydraulic fracturing might be leaving the impression with some people that this is not the mining-friendly jurisdiction it once was.

Even Energy and Mines Minister Donald Arseneault acknowledges rising commentary, at least among certain economic pundits, that when it comes to natural resource extraction, the province is punching below its weight class. “I don’t necessarily think this is about geology,” he says. “We do have to continue to encourage companies to keep exploring. Maybe some people are looking at New Brunswick with a negative view [thanks to] fracking.”

By “fracking”, he means, specifi cally, the moratorium his fi rst-term Liberal government has slapped on the practice of blowing water and chemicals into tight plays of shale to liberate the oil and gas trapped there. The technology, controversial just about everywhere it’s been used, was banned late last year until the province satisfi es itself that it is safe, environmentally neutral and that the rights of First Nations’ communities will be respected in the hunt for natural riches across their territories.

Still, regardless of the public relations chill the fracking moratorium may be having on mining in general, is there any merit in the observation that, for whatever reason, the resource industry in the province is oddly underwhelming these days?

The new normalNew Brunswick has a storied mining history and gets high marks for being an industry-friendly jurisdiction. So why isn’t there more activity in the province?By Alec Bruce

Investment

Natural Resources Magazine / Vol. 17 No. 2 2015NR44

If so, “odd” would be the correct word. For generations, mining employed thousands of New Brunswickers in every region of the province, generating millions in royalties for provincial governments. As recently as March 2014, the New Brunswick government (under the Progressive Conservatives) issued this statement: “Mining policy in New Brunswick is considered to be the second-best in Canada and the seventh-best in the world, according to the latest Survey of Mining Companies prepared by the Fraser Institute.”

In the same statement, then Energy and Mines Minister Craig Leonard said, “New Brunswick continues to be among the best-ranked jurisdictions in the world for mining and exploration.”

The Fraser Institute report placed New Brunswick immediately ahead of Newfoundland and Labrador and behind only Alberta as the Canadian jurisdiction having the best mining policy. What’s more, the government reported, “New Brunswick ranked among the top 10 jurisdictions internationally for the second consecutive year, placing immediately ahead of Nevada, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Norway and behind only Sweden, Finland, Alberta, Ireland, Wyoming and Western Australia.”

Certainly provincial officials and industry representatives actually plying their trades and technologies in New Brunswick today do not subscribe to the notion that mining activity here lags in any perceptible way. What, they wonder, are the standards of measurement? Is it

sensible, for example, to compare industrial activity here with that of any other province, where history, conditions and even financing agreements vary vastly across a wide spectrum?

Perhaps, it’s more accurate to say that New Brunswick, which no longer employs thousands in the industry, but merely a few hundred, is simply not competing with its own past – and hasn’t since 2013 when Spanish mining giant Xstrata (the last in a long line of owners) shuttered its Brunswick Mine, which had been one of the world’s largest and most profitable zinc producers, employing more than 7,000, over its 48 years of life.

All mines close eventually, but that doesn’t mean the regions where they are located are prepared for the hole they leave in the economy when they do. “Brunswick Mine was the flagship of the province. It lasted a lot longer than it was supposed to – (longer) than anyone expected it to,” Arseneault says. “Mines like that typically have lifespans of 15

“ From a permitting perspective, it’s a fantastic province to work in. The province will work with you.”

Mark Cruise, president and CEO Trevali Mining

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Online extras: naturalresourcesmagazine.com NR45

or 20 or 25 years. I remember when I was natural resources minister of the province back in 2006; the fi rst (royalty) payment that came at that time was something like $110 million just from that one operation. So, in a way, we were spoiled.”

In fact, if the mining industry in New Brunswick is necessarily smaller than it was during its storied past, it is no less energetic or economically courageous. Northcliff Resources Ltd. of Vancouver is currently planning a $579-million build north of Fredericton to mine tungsten and molybdenum at a project it calls Sisson. Saskatchewan-based Potash Corp’s Picadilly mine extension in the Sussex area is reported to be worth more than $2.1 billion (the company actually received a $35-million royalty from the province to seal the deal). Meanwhile, Vancouver-based Trevali Mining Corporation is ramping into full production at its Bathurst Camp location (the home of the now-closed Brunswick Mine operations).

According to Trevali’s website, “The wholly-owned Caribou Mine and Mill Complex consists of a developed underground mine with signifi cant resources of zinc-lead-silver-copper-gold, a fully permitted 3,000-tonne-per-day processing mill, fl otation recovery plant, metallurgical and geochemical laboratories, and a tailings treatment facility, all located approximately 50 kilometres west of Bathurst, New Brunswick, Canada.”

As for the “atmosphere and environment” for mining in the province, Trevali’s president and CEO Mark Cruise couldn’t be happier. “From a permitting perspective, it’s a fantastic province to work in,” he says. “The province will work with you. That is great to see. Also, people understand mining here. We have nothing but positive responses there. We also have a positive relationship with First Nations. Seventeen per cent of our workforce is First Nations, and we are moving towards 20 per cent.”

None of which, of course, makes the industry a walk in the park. As New Brunswick transitions from its past to its future, the timing, arguably, couldn’t be worse – and for reasons that have very little to do with the province’s appetite for, or ability to compete in, world markets.

“At the end of the day, there have to be deposits to develop. We own the three largest zinc deposits,” Cruise says. “But the industry, as a whole, is in the doldrums at the moment, so if you are a small company or a junior company trying to raise money in the capital markets, it is eff ectively closed to you at this point in time. Even if you like the province, and you think there is a very good prospect of fi nding more [resources], if you can’t raise the funds . . . still,

“ We do have to continue to encourage companies to keep exploring. Maybe some people are looking at New Brunswick with a negative view [thanks to] fracking.”

Donald Arseneault, minister New Brunswick Energy and Mines

Drone Aerial Photography and Digital Terrain Modelling

Halifax, NS & Fredericton, NB www.terraneaerial.com

Natural Resources Magazine / Vol. 17 No. 2 2015NR46

FEEDBACK*dcampbell@naturalresourcesmagazine.com a @NRM_Editor; #Thenewnormal

the outlook for base metals is pretty strong.”

A few high-profi le clunkers over the years certainly don’t help assuage perceptions of an industry in the doldrums. According to a CBC report in March of 2015, “The high cost of building a mine and fl uctuating mineral prices have caused serious fi nancial dilemmas for other mining companies with operations in Atlantic Canada. Shortly after building an antimony mine in Newfoundland and Labrador, Moncton-based Roycefi eld Resources shut down operations in 1998 as the price of antimony decreased. The company went into receivership in 2001.”

In 2008, Blue Note Mining (the western Canadian company that was Trevali’s predecessor at Caribou) closed its complex there, blaming depressed zinc and lead prices, which, one report in the Calgary Herald said, “more than off set the massive cost cuts it implemented. It plans to reopen the project once prices allow it.” As it happened, Blue Note Mining never did get around to reopening it.

Even Northcliff Resources raised some eyebrows this spring when it revealed that it didn’t actually have any of the $579 million it needs to proceed at its central New Brunswick site. “Not too many companies have $600-million sitting

in the treasury,” Chris Zahovskis, Northcliff ’s president and CEO told the CBC. “If we don’t get the funding, it will be very diffi cult to build the project.”

Still, he’s not giving up. In an email, Myke Clark, the fi rm’s vice-president of public aff airs confi rmed that, “While Chris (Zahovskis) would be available for an interview generally; unfortunately he isn’t able to speak at this time. We are currently in the midst of a public comment period/review stage for the Sisson Environmental Impact Assessment and we would rather not comment about the New Brunswick mining jurisdiction while the project is before the government for review and decision.”

Fair enough. At least that suggests the project remains in play. Even if the mining isn’t what it once was, that’s more than anyone can say about shale gas development in New Brunswick at the moment. |nrm

$579 millionThe estimated capital cost to build the Sisson tungsten-molybdenum open pit mine north of

Fredericton, New Brunswick

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