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HAY RIVER
Hay River's town council is worried a proposed rare earth mining operation, which would see as many as 70 new full time jobs for the town, could be delayed by up to a year.

Avalon Rare Minerals Inc. is proposing to build a rare earth mineral mine at Nechalacho (Thor Lake, 100-kilometres south-east of Yellowknife) and a hydrometallurgical processing plant at Pine Point, about an hour's drive from Hay River.

The proposal has been at the environmental review stage since 2010. At Sept. 24's council meeting, Avalon's vice -president of operations David Swisher told council if the review isn't finished soon, it could delay the project by a year. The review board asked for a second round of information reporting on the project.

"It is a feasible project. We're hoping to have the feasibility study completed by March 2013, and then roll into early works construction in the summer of 2013," Swisher said.

But in order to hit those timelines, the company needs to take advantage of next summer's barging season, which runs July to October, in order to begin construction. If the environmental review continues to drag on, the company will miss the window and be forced to wait another year.

"What really hinges is the site at Nechalacho. It's the only site with restricted transportation," Swisher said, adding that barging equipment and materials up the lake is the most efficient way to access the site.

"We are working feverishly at trying to move the schedule up," Swisher said, adding that in order to hit the summer barging season window, the review would need to be finished by February 2013.

Swisher said priority would be given to the company's aboriginal partners for pre-construction training and that the goal is to retain as many workers in the NWT as possible.

"It's good business sense. I don't want to transport 50 of the 70 people we need from the south," Swisher said.

"This seems like a really great project with mitigated environmental risk and large benefits for this community and this region," said Hay River Mayor Ken Latour.

Council passed a motion to send a "strongly worded" letter to the Mackenzie Valley Review Board urging it to speed up its environmental assessment.

"We need to present a united voice from this side of the lake. I really appreciate the work that the (Chamber of Commerce) has been doing and our MLAs getting behind it. We need to see this. I hope they can see the gravity of this and move forward as expediently as possible," said Coun. Kevin Wallington.

The processing plant at Pine Point would provide 70 full time jobs, Swisher said. During constriction, which is expected to take about two years, it would create anywhere from 80 to 160 more jobs as well. All told, the South Slave region would see annual benefits of between $37.7 million and $53.8 million, $8 million of which would be wages.

Rare earth metals are used in a wide variety of consumer electronics that are in high demand.

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