Mining and Exploration

Africa Oil Corp has signed a contract with Sakson Drilling and Oil Services to provide a rig to drill the first exploration wells in Puntland, Somalia, for more than 20 years.

Spudding of the first well in Dharoor is expected to commence during the fourth quarter of this year.

Drilling locations have been selected over two prospects in the Dharoor and Nugaal valleys covering nearly 36,000 square kilometres. Each prospect is targeting a gross best estimate oil-in-place of approximately 900 million barrels.

London-based oil and gas company Terra Resources has entered into a financial partnership with Hendon Energy Fund 2011 to develop an oil and gas concession in Russia.

Hendon has agreed to partner with Terra Resources to fulfil its funding commitments, which are estimated to be $90 million, for the development of the 85,000 acre oil and gas concession in Kalmykia.

Ireland’s PetroNeft Resources has announced a “significant” oil discovery in one of its two Russian licence areas.

The discovery was made at Sibkrayevskaya, in Licence 61 at Tomsk Oblast, Siberia.

PetroNeft holds a 100 per cent interest in Licence 61, a 4,991 square kilometre oil and gas licence; as well as a 50 per cent operating interest in Licence 67, which covers an area of 2,447 square kilometres.

Valiant Investments has announced that it has invested a further US$50,000 into Trilith Resources.

Valiant said that the funds will be used by UK-based Trilith to acquire natural resource projects in Zambia and Tanzania, with a principle focus on gold and copper mineralisation.

UK-based Valiant has now invested a total of $150,000 (approximately €104,000) into Trilith.

After reporting strong profits for the half year ending 30 June, Swiss-based mining group Xstrata intends to expand its Canadian operations.

Operating profit rose 31 percent to $4.25 billion with the company’s cost reduction initiatives achieving $52 million of real unit cost savings.

In a separate announcement, Xstrata said it had approved two Xstrata Nickel projects totaling US$649 million as it continues its investment in growth options within its Canadian portfolio.

Mineral development company Energy Fuels Inc. has purchased a mining lease in southeast Utah's Sage Plain District from Uranium Energy Corp. for CAD$500,000.

The Crain Lease is situated on approximately 640-acres in San Juan County, Utah, near the historic Calliham and Sage Mines already controlled by Energy Fuels.

Goldcorp, the world’s second largest gold producer, has revealed mixed fortunes in its second quarter results.

Revenues of $1.3 billion represent an increase of 62 percent over Q2, 2010, and adjusted net earnings climbed 111 percent to $420 million, but a series of misadventures in various operations have led the company to revise its production forecasts for the rest of the year.

After a couple of years of uncertainty, the biggest iron ore company in Canada is in the process of becoming even bigger, as Jeff Daniels reports.

When you’ve been running a mine for the best part of half a century and have already produced over 1 billion tons of iron ore concentrate and pellets, you’d be justified in thinking that the last thing on anyone’s mind was an expensive expansion program.

Buenaventura is Peru's largest publicly-traded precious metals company and a major holder of mining rights in Peru: it is a vital player in the country’s economy and is investing with international partners to develop Peru’s mining sector.

If the feasibility report comes in as expected the former owner of the Schaft Creek deposit will have a big decision to make, as Copper Fox CEO Elmer Stewart explains to Alan Swaby.

At the time of writing, it’s easy to imagine that the computers at Teck Resources are doing some extra bench presses followed by a daily 10km run for improved stamina. Anything, in fact, to get them in peak condition for the serious number crunching they are going to have to do, starting in the next few months.