Northwest Territories a vast store of mineral wealth

A wealth of minerals can be found in the Northwest Territories.

Zinc, gold and lead are the major mineral commodities currently being exploited. Minor or byproduct commodities include silver, cadmium, arsenic, bismuth and antimony. Past production included significant tungsten, uranium, cobalt, copper and nickel, plus minor lithium, mica and graphite. Future development may include diamonds, beryllium, rare-earth elements, iron and coal.

Mineral exploitation began well before Europeans arrived in what is now known as the Northwest Territories. Copper and soapstone were recovered, made into artifacts and traded by the native peoples.

Each wave of historical development in the North looked at mineral showings. The exploration of the High Arctic saw Martin Frobisher mining 1,800 tonnes of worthless iron pyrite from near Baffin Island in 1577. In 1771, Samuel Hearne of the fur-trading Hudson’s Bay Company was shown copper near the Coppermine River by the Dene chief, Matonabbee. In the 1890s, local natives led prospectors, traveling overland to the Klondike gold rush, to lead-zinc showings in the Pine Point area.

Eldorado was the first modern mine in the Northwest Territories. In 1900, Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) geologists J. McIntosh Bell and Charles Camsell noted copper and cobalt mineralization on the east shore of Great Bear Lake.

After reading Bell’s report, Gilbert Labine flew to Great Bear Lake in the spring of 1930 and made the discovery that led to the opening of the Eldorado mine at Port Radium. It opened in 1932 and operated intermittently until 1982. Total production was 6,808 tonnes uranium, 46,930 kg silver, 226,800 kg cobalt, 127 tonnes nickel, 99.8 tonnes lead, 1,292 tonnes copper and 450 grams radium (worth $200,000 per gram in the 1930s).

It was with the development of the Eldorado mine that the Northwest Territories first realized the indirect benefits of non-renewable resource development. The mine was supplied by aircraft and barge. The mine’s barging operation eventually evolved into the Northern Transportation Co. The Northwest Territories’ first gold rush began in the early 1930s. Although Yellowknife’s first gold mine, the Burwash gold-bearing quartz vein, was discovered in 1933, it was Norman Jennejohn’s 1935 discovery of visible gold during a GSC mapping project on the west side of Yellowknife Bay that prompted the gold rush. The Con mine poured its first gold brick in 1938. A second gold rush began in 1938 with the discovery of visible gold in the Indin Lake area. The Second World War slowed down exploration and development activities, but post-war mining resumed with vigor, starting with the discovery of the second major Yellowknife gold deposit in 1944; the Giant mine poured its first gold brick in 1948.

Other gold mines, including the Ruth, Tundra, Camlaren, Thompson-Lundmark, Salmita, Discovery, Cullaton Lake and Colomac have operated during the last 50 years.

Since 1928, more than 450 tonnes of gold have been produced from more than 25 mines in the Northwest Territories. The Con, Giant, Discovery (closed 1968) and Lupin mines are significant million-ounce-plus producers. Between 1939 and 1965, gold was the leading Northwest Territories mineral commodity.

Tungsten and zinc are the two other mineral commodities that have been exploited in significant quantities in the Northwest Territories. Production of tungsten at the Cantung mine on the Northwest Territories-Yukon border began in 1962 but was suspended in 1986 because of poor world markets. Cantung was the largest operating tungsten mine in the Western World. The Pine Point base metal mine opened in 1964, the Nanisivik mine in 1976, followed by the Polaris mine in 1982. On an annual basis, since 1965, zinc production has surpassed gold in value and continues to do so despite the closure of Pine Point in 1988.

Historically, the Pine Point base metal operation mined the greatest tonnage of all mines in the Northwest Territories. Situated south of Great Slave Lake, Pine Point was a multiple open-pit mining operation that ran from 1964 to 1988. The infrastructure included a railway line, hydro dam, minesite and townsite with a population of 2,000.

Pine Point cost the federal government and the mining company $125 million to develop and generated in excess of $2 billion in revenues during its lifetime. A total of 64.2 million tonnes (70.8 million tons) of ore, at an average grade of 10.1% combined lead and zinc, was mined from 48 orebodies within a 5 x 65 km area. A total of 10.3 million tonnes of concentrate was transported mainly to smelters in southern British Columbia and Japan. The decision to cease mining was made in 1987. The last Pine Point resident left the townsite in late 1988. Concentrate was shipped until 1990. By 1991, the townsite and surface mine facilities were removed. The open pits, waste rock dumps and tailings impoundment were reclaimed.

The vast scale of the sub-Arctic, barrenlands and high Arctic islands of the Territories has compelled the mining industry to provide innovative solutions for the development of remote deposits completely lacking in infrastructure. Much of the transportation infrastructure in the Northwest Territories was built between the 1940s and 1970s in response to various socio-economic needs, usually stemming from mineral development. Yellowknife became the territorial capital and major centre of population in the Northwest Territories, mainly because of the staying power of its two major gold producers.

The Mackenzie Highway, built in 1949, followed the winter tractor train route from Grimshaw, Alta., to Hay River, N.W.T., first used to haul supplies destined for the Port Radium and Yellowknife mines.

Echo Bay Mines (TSE), drawing from its experience at Eldorado, flew in construction materials and mine equipment to near the Arctic Circle in order to develop the Lupin gold mine during the early 1980s. The company operates by trucking fuel and bulk materials via a 580-km winter road. — From a federal government Mineral Sector Report.