12-02-2025
Australian owner of N.S. gold projects seeks to sell operations
The Australian company that ran Nova Scotia's Touquoy gold mine in Moose River, N.S., is hoping to divest itself of its Atlantic operations.
St Barbara announced Wednesday it is open to a "sale, vend-in or demerger" of its assets in Nova Scotia, which include the Fifteen Mile Stream, Beaver Dam and Cochrane Hill projects, as well as the Touquoy site.
Those projects are run by a subsidiary of St Barbara called Atlantic Mining Nova Scotia.
The Fifteen Mile Stream, Beaver Dam and Cochrane Hill projects are still in the development phase, do not have permits and are not currently involved in provincial or federal environmental assessment processes.
Active gold mining at the Touquoy site stopped in January 2023 and the company then turned its attention to processing stockpiled rock. That activity stopped in late September 2023 and no production has occurred at the site since.
Project 'financially robust,' company says
"The decision to separate Atlantic from St Barbara is underpinned by the opportunity to unlock the full value potential of the Atlantic projects under a Canadian listed company with a local leadership team, to focus on delivering upcoming project milestones and benefit from being closer to regulators and key stakeholders," St Barbara CEO Andrew Strelein said in a news release.
"Atlantic is a highly attractive and financially robust project and has the potential to be in production within 12 months from permitting approval."
Atlantic Mining declined an interview request but said in a statement there are no redundancies or layoffs resulting from the decision.
Touquoy reclamation bond
Any new company that takes over the operations will also take over reclamation efforts at the former Touquoy mine. Atlantic Mining has an $80-million bond with the province to cover expenses associated with bringing the site back to a natural state. The company says it has spent over $7 million so far on reclamation activities.
But the reclamation process has not been without challenges.
Last year, the company appealed the reclamation criteria laid out by Environment Minister Tim Halman, saying the conditions set for water quality in the lakes and rivers around the mine cannot be met, and that the timelines were unreasonable.
The province rejected that appeal and the company then .
St Barbara has previously called into question the future of mining in Nova Scotia, accusing the Environment Department of "regulating the [mining] industry out of existence."
Atlantic Mining said in its statement that it expects the separation to occur later this year.
