New use for the Marmora Iron Mine

[www.thestar.com]

hmmmm

Maggie,

Very interesting and promising. This could solve a lot of our energy problems. We certainly have plenty of abandoned quarries here in Pennsylvania and around the world. Maybe they could use solar to work the pumps?

Best wishe,

Joe

Neat article. When I'm stressed, I think of that big water filled pit. It really was thrilling to see it in person.

Hmmmm.... is right. I think that the outline of the operation is a "best-scenario" and sketchy, at best. Sounds very tentative to me in reality.

1) This is in cottage company. People wil SCREAM if they try to buy/expropriate the cottages/homes, etc. for the reservoir. a lot of surface area will be required. They would have to create a significant LAKE!
2) $660M capital will certainly escalate with inflation.
3) If this was such a great idea, the Ontario Power Authority person that commented would have SOME sort of positive note in his comments.
4) would only have a slight chance of making sense if there was peak power requirements EVERY day, 365 days of the year. Otherwise the financial case would fall apart.
5) For the teeny bit of power that would be generated for this enormous cost, it would be smarter to buy the surge power from Quebec at a fraction of the cost per KWH (my guess).

My guess is that Mantento will convince them to approve a license in principal, raise many millions of $ on the stock market from over optimistic investors, do initial feasibility studies, early stage engineering work, stall for time, stall for gpovernment subsidies and pay himself handsomely out of the stock market proceeds for 15 years or so, until shareholders can him and the company disappears.

In the meantime, I hope we can still collect minerals there!!

Has anyone heard what the status is on access to the Marmora? Aecom closed down access to collecting because of all the trespassing problems they were having from ATVs and swimmers and since they still are not allowing access to clubs I assume this hasn't changed.

Does anyone know if this is a temporary ban or permanent?

Just curious. Thanks.

Andrew

Just called them yesterday. Access will continue to be forbidden as they prepare the transfer of the property to the Power Company and prepare to begin construction. The man who used to monitor us rock collectors is no longer with the company.

Very interesting! I'm all for green energy, this is the stuff we really need to be pushing.

I love the idea of them moving around that massive mountain of dump rock. I suspect there are more minerals in there than we've seen so far.

Best thing is... it can't get any worse for the collecting community... what with no access at the moment.

Maybe we should start lobbying them for collecting days right now???

Thanks for the update Donald. It doesn't sound very promising. I think the person who supervised the collecting trips was a big sponsor for collectors at Aecon.

He was also a nice guy too. When I was there last fall he was telling me stories about the problems they were having with trespassers using the old pit as a swimming hole and with ATVs around the mine dumps and numerous air-ambulance pick-ups. It sounded like the situation had gotten pretty bad.

Tim - not to be a Poindexter, but it's not actually green power rather than the storage of energy during off-peak periods to generate electricity during peak periods. There will be no net generation of electricity.

It would be awesome to get in one last time during the construction after the dumps have been turned over. I would be surprised if Northland Power would be interested in letting collectors in - but we can hope!

Andrew