Rising tin prices, rare metals spark interest in old mine site

By Michael Gorman

THE VANGUARD

NovaNewsNow.com

For a site that's seen no activity since 1992, a lot could soon be happening at the former East Kemptville tin mine.

Avalon Ventures, an Ontario based mineral exploration company, is looking at the site to possibly open a mine for tin and rare metals.

During an interview with The Vanguard, Don Bubar, the company's CEO and president, said Avalon has created a modern database of the site based on the mine's history. As the price of tin started to go up, Bubar started to think the tin project would once again be attractive as well as the rare metals aspect to which he was first attracted. The company conducted a desktop study to look at the project's economic estimates.

"Basically, at current prices, it looks attractive," he said.

Bubar, a Truro native, has an extensive past in the Canadian mineral sector with more than 30 years of experience. He's a geologist by trade with several degrees. He is also the director of the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada and chairs the group's Aboriginal Affairs Committee, which advocates for reaching out to First Nations communities when such projects are established near First Nations groups.

Bubar started Avalon Ventures about 13 years ago when it was a dormant shell company. His plan to build the company started with gold and base metals. This was cut short in the last 1990s as a result of turmoil in the gold world. Around that time the company also acquired a rare metals asset in Northwestern Ontario. That was the site that helped keep the company going in the face of the difficulties with gold.

With the belief that there would be an emerging market for rare metals in high tech applications, such as the coating on TV screens and computer monitors, Bubar set out to find sites with rare metal deposits. One such project that proved fruitful was in the Northwest Territories. The other was East Kemptville. Bubar said he was aware of the former tin mine operation through his experiences working in Nova Scotia and in the business in general, but it was while he attended a government open house on the mining sector that focused on the former mine that he started to think there could be rare metals at the site besides tin.

Based on research, Bubar was able to conclude that the East Kemptville site has significant quantities of rare metals such as Indium to make it worth investigating. Further investigation showed the mineral title was available and he acquired it in 2005.

The next step, said Bubar, is to take the desktop study further by doing a preliminary economic analysis, which is basically an early stage feasibility study.

"We're going to have an engineering firm that's independent audit the historical resource numbers for what's in the ground for tin and rare metals," he said. "And then, based on that, do a little more rigorous economic assessment . . . It will help us build a business case as to why this merits further investment."

Needless to say, none of this is going to happen over night. Bubar estimates it will take three to four years to be sure if they can move ahead with the operation. An added obstacle is obtaining the site's surface rights, which are still held by Rio Algom and its parent company BHP Billiton, meaning at the moment Bubar's people are unable to get on the site to do work. BHP is also held to an environmental obligation by the province to deal with acid runoff from the former operation.

Bubar said he believes they have found a way to address the environmental issue, rectify it and then further develop the site.

"We really believe that there's a win-win-win opportunity here in that by renewing mining operations there we could potentially clean up the existing liability," he said. "We think there's a real possibility you could reprocess that waste (at the site), get out the rest of the tin and the rare metals and then put the rest of the waste back in the hole in the ground and clean up the site at the same time."

Further to this would be more modern technological approaches in terms of the way the mine would be operated and managed, thus removing the risk of future environmental liabilities.

Bubar's group is a long way from being ready to post job ads for a new mining site, however based on his calculations, expectations and knowledge of the industry, a new site could very easily be of the same scale as past operations in East Kemptville.

"(I envision) something similar in scale to the historic operation," he said. "I've been talking to some members of the local community here — there's lots of memories still of that operation. It was a very important contributor to the local economy and it's missed now."

His message to people at this point is that they want to gauge local support.

"These days, development of a mining operation is as much a political exercise as it is an exercise in science and engineering. You need a social licence to develop a new mine and this one has its challenges politically because of the past history there and the existing environmental liability there has to be dealt with. Before we invest a lot more capital and advance in this we want to make sure the community is behind us in wanting to see this happen."

To that effect, Bubar said he has talked with West Nova MP Robert Thibault, Yarmouth MLA Richard Hurlburt and also wants to speak with Chief Deborah Robinson of the Acadia First Nations Band, something Bubar said they make a point of doing any time they look at working in territory that is near traditional First Nations land.

"Whenever we work anywhere in Canada we always make sure we find out which First Nation's territory we're working in and consult with them early on to make them aware of our activities on their traditional lands and see if there's any partnership opportunities with the First Nations and also with other businesses in the local community."

Feedback so far, he said, is positive.

As for the possible longevity of the project were it to go ahead, Bubar said that will emerge as they conduct the economic assessment of the project. With such a large resource the price of the minerals would in part impact the operation. If they can get it going sooner than later and repay the original capital investment, Bubar believes it could run for some time.

"There's lots of potential for adding to those resources in the regional area. There's lots of indications for other potential for tin."