Mining firm Rio Tinto has announced its operations in the Highlands are under review, leaving around 150 staff concerned for their jobs. The firm said “all options” would be considered for its aluminium smelter and hydroelectric plants in Fort William and Kinlochleven.
The NSW Environment Protection Authority is investigating the collapse of a second open-cut mine dam wall in the Hunter Valley. Millions of litres of sediment-laden water escaped when a bund wall partially collapsed at Rio Tinto’s Mount Thorley Warkworth mine on January 6.
Over the holiday period, reports emerged suggesting that the Papua New Guinea government intended to purchase Rio Tinto’s 53.83% equity stake in Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL). This proposal earned strong condemnation from the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG). With good reason, the Papua New Guinea state deployed brutal violence during the 1990s in an effort to keep Bougainville’s Panguna copper mine open (operated then by BCL), which at the time was a key revenue source for the Namaliu government.
Keen to cash in on the region’s resource wealth is the British-based mineral exploration company Beowulf Mining, which, through its Swedish subsidiary Jokkmokk Iron Mines AB, has applied for an exploitation concession for the Kallak North iron ore deposit. Noted as an Area of National Interest by the Swedish Geological Survey, the company announced an indicated resource base of 118.5 million tons—one of the largest deposits in Sweden not yet to have been exploited.
The world’s number five diversified mining company, Anglo American announced a “radical portfolio restructuring” a month ago. The company with roots going back more than a hundred years to South Africa’s gold and diamond fields said it would cut around 85,000 employees, almost two-thirds of its workforce.
