Not in BC mines are not viable projects. The second any mines start to consider starting up they will be tied up in court due to environmental groups or more importantly, land claims issues. Until the land claims issues are settled, the chances of these mines starting within 10 years are minimal

Name a few of them darkken..

The reality is,mining is a major building block to prosperity in B.C.
It deserves a lot more respect than it gets.
At the same time,the permitting process itself,needs some serious work to speed up the process.
That is where mining becomes a politicial and environmental football.
At the same time,many smaller mining companies don't have the bucks behind them to bring a mine into production,and are operating purely on speculation.
What they are really looking for is a major mining player to buy them out at some point.
They can be found on the Venture Exchange,where they hang around for years, pumping and dumping shares.

I wonder where the Power(Megawatts) come from, Hydro keeps telling us every Minute to conserve Power we are a net Importer ?
Let the little Guy pay the same per KWH as the big Company that would be a Start, I also would like to see the Rates per KWH .

Andyfreeze...100% correct.

Northman:
Here is a few of them...Milligan, Prosperity, Kemess II, Tatsenshini, Klappan Red Criss. There are more but I dont have the time to research them

Milligan went through but it was tied up for years in litigation. Granted, not every mining proposal is a good one, but BC has a reputation for being unfriendly to mining proposals.

Government: S.N.A.F.U.
metalman.

Actually darkken,Mt.Milligan came to the permitting and building stage quite quickly, in comparison to potential mines like Prosperity and Kemess.
But then,the company was not trying to dump tailings into a lake.
That just isn't acceptable in this day and age,and I am suprised that any compnay would be stupid enough to even try that.
From the time Terrane bought the Mt.Milligan property,things went relatively well,and at no time were they tied up for years in litigation.
The owners of Terrane set an example on how to build a mine properly, and the only real delays were with the environmental permitting process time factor itself.
There again,there was no problem with the environment process per say,other than some fine tuning at the very end.
The problem was with the speed at which the government/s moves, as always!
Mt Milligan is now well on it's way to digging a paying hole, and the rest is history.
Some of these other wannabe mining companies could take some lessons here.

Andy, you also got to remember the Mt Milligan project was already once approved in the late 80's when Dome use to own it.


It is true, that Kemess north should have known better to destroy a lake for the sake of getting the ore out cheaply. As far as Prosperity goes, wouldm't they have learned something from Kemess north. I hope it cost these mine owners millions of dollars to resubmit.

I support the mine developments, do it right, minimize the impact and employ the people. The copper and gold is way too much to do the fast and easy.

You're right,He spoke...Mt.Milligan was in fact permitted under Placer Dome, but on a smaller scale, as I understand it.
Terrane expanded on the original plan that Placer Dome put together and took everything a few steps further environmentaly, just to make sure there would be no snags.
I can't help but wonder how Kemess and Taseko/Prosperity managed to get their plan of using a lake for a tailing dump past their board of directors in the first place?
Someone must have done a damn expensive sell job on them!
It's also interesting that apparently both the federal and the provincial governments, knew that both companies were planning using a lake as a tailings dump and said nothing, until the protest got to loud to accept the plans.
Go figure.

My apologies...I am way off topic!

Not off topic..What you outlined is the prime issues facing the industry.

The plan was to use the lakes as waste rock dumps and not for tailings. The general public does not know the difference between the two. Waste rock is the rock they remove out of an open pit or mine in order to get at the ore, the rock that is non ore bearing which has the potential to create acid rock drainage. Usually this rock depending on its FeS content is cast aside ajacent to the pit in piles. The best way to prevent acid rock drainage is to put iron sulphide bearing minerals under water so they cant oxidize and create acid rock. Depending on the volume of waste rock a deep lake is a prospective area to put waste rock. Tailings from the mill are a fine sand which a special dam is needed to be created to store it. In the case of mt milligan the potential acid generating waste rock is small enough where it can be buried in the tailings dam and neutralized becuase it will be under water.

Darkken the projects you mentioned were not held up due to litigation but market and infastruture issues.. Example there is no rail service to ship coal out of mt Klappan. Kemmes North and Proseprity were not accepted in "their current state" meaing that they can revise a plan that doesnt ivolve destroying lakes. Kemess north is going through an underground study at the moment. Mt milligan was shelved due to weak copper prices in the 90's and now is in full construction phase. Red Chris is still going through a feasibility and base line study which is the normal process for a mine project..

Right on northman...there is a big difference between waste rock and tailings, which should be clarified.
Unfortunately,to a greenie protester who hates mining,it is all the same thing.
If they had their way,B.C.would be a very large park, and everyone would be unemployed!
Mining has paid a price for that over the years because of bad mining practices and regulations in the past.
That no longer applies in todays mining world,nor should it be allowed to again.
In general,there is an evil stigma attached to mining in B.C.that needs to be erased, once and for all.