There are fresh hopes Cornwall's mining industry could be revived.

Test drills for tin and tungsten near Callington and Indian Queens are expected to start this year.

Companies New Age Exploration Limited and Treliver Minerals have acquired the rights to carry explore deposits underneath Kelly Bray near Callington and Treliver Manor Farm near Indian Queens respectively.

Similar work searching for tin, copper and zinc has already been carried out at South Crofty Mine in Camborne.

Chris Rogers, Mining Consultant for Redruth-based firm Cornwall Consultants, said: "It's to do with the economic heritage of the county, and obviously the future possible employment and wealth that might come from mining these deposits locally, and the benefit to the local communities.

"Obviously if they did find things, they'd have to go through mining and planning leases. They'd have to look at environmental constraints, they'd have to look at processing constraints, and the general viability of the deposits in these areas."

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Boundary County Commissioners will hold a public hearing at 9 a.m. Tuesday, February 19, n the conference room of the Extension Office behind the Boundary County Courthouse, to accept public comment on two appeals of Conditional Use Permit 11-063 granted Tungsten Holdings, Inc., to operate a gravel pit on a seven acre parcel, RP65N01W200150A, located 1.6 miles south of Porthill on the Farm to Market Road.

Patrick and Ada Gardiner and Bryan and Sara Ferguson are appealing the decision of the Boundary County Planning and Zoning Commission to grant that permit in a continuing battle that's been going on since 2005.

The application was initially submitted that year as a special use permit, and county commissioners, imposing several conditions and restrictions, overruled the planning and zoning commission's recommendation to deny the permit, granting approval and allowing the pit to go into production.

Pat and Ada Gardiner, cattle breeders who operate near the site, filed an appeal, citing, among other things, potential adverse effects to their herd as well as the potential damage to their water wells caused by blasting.

That appeal went all the way to the Idaho Supreme Court, which ruled in favor of the Gardiners, not so much on the merits of there case but because of inadequacies in the county zoning ordinance in effect at the time, which made no specific mention of gravel pits, but allowed consideration of any use proposed that was not a use by right, permitted use or conditional use as a special use. The Supreme Court ruled that the language was too vague to constitute meaningful land use planning and overturned the commissioner's decision on the permit and shutting down operation of the pit.

At the time, work was already underway on drafting a new county comprehensive plan and zoning ordinance, in which the placement of gravel pits and mines in the various zones were spelled out. In the agriculture/forestry zone district, which the parcel in question is zoned, such use was listed as a conditional use. Shortly after the new ordinance was adopted, Tungsten Holdings again made application, and the planning and zoning permit was approved, despite the same objections by the Gardiners and additional objection from Bryan and Sara Ferguson, who had purchased a 10-acre residential lot from Tungsten Holdings near the site and built a home based on perceived assurances in covenants and restrictions that attached to their land that no such use would be allowed in the un-platted subdivision developed by Tungsten around the pit subsequent to the initial issuance of the special use permit.

Further information on this application is available at the Planning and Zoning Office, Room 16 of the Courthouse, and the application and appeals are available for public review.

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Several business groups challenging new rules that require companies to disclose whether their products contain minerals blamed for fueling violence in Africa said Wednesday regulators hadn’t adequately analyzed the rules’ impact.

The groups said in court papers that the Securities and Exchange Commission had itself admitted it didn’t know if the rules would benefit the people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and its surrounding region, the stated intent of Congress in creating the provision.

“Thus, the Commission violated its statutory obligations to apprise itself of the costs and benefits of the rule and the available regulatory alternatives before saddling U.S. public companies with billions of dollars in regulatory burdens,” the groups said. “This failure of analysis infects the entire rule.”

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the Business Roundtable asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to vacate the “conflict-mineral” rules in October. The groups fully explained their arguments for the first time on Wednesday in a 75-page brief.

UPDATE: John Nester, a spokesman for the SEC, defended the Commission’s analysis in an email.

“We believe our legal interpretation and economic analysis are sound, and we look forward to defending the rule that Congress directed us to write,” Nester said.

The “conflict minerals” rules, which were mandated by the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial overhaul, have been a source of friction between the SEC and companies ever since the law was passed. Under the current rules, U.S.-listed companies are required to disclose whether their products have been manufactured with any tantalum, tin, gold or tungsten used to finance violence in central Africa.

Companies have said the requirement would be burdensome and expensive. In August, the SEC estimated the rules would cost companies a total of $3 billion to $4 billion upfront to comply, plus more than $200 million a year. The SEC also estimated around 6,000 U.S. and foreign companies would have to comply with the conflict-minerals rules, affecting manufacturers of a range of products, including smartphones, light bulbs and footwear.

On Wednesday, the groups said that the SEC’s estimates are actually low, and that a financial burden of that size shouldn’t be imposed without determining whether the rules will yield any benefits. The SEC’s lack of analysis, according to the groups, violates the Administrative Procedure Act and the agency’s heightened obligation under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to analyze the economic impact of its rules.

The groups also argued that the rules violate companies’ First Amendment rights by compelling them to publicly state their products are “not DRC conflict free,” that is, they contain conflict minerals.

“Even worse, this compelled disclosure will frequently be false,” the groups argued. “Many of the companies forced to make it will not be manufacturing products containing minerals that funded armed groups. Rather, the companies will simply be unable to trace their supply chains to determine the minerals’ origins.”

Tungsten Manufacturer & Supplier: Chinatungsten Online - http://www.chinatungsten.com
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Hunter Hillcoat is a mining analyst with Investec Securities in London. Before Investec, Hillcoat spent 7 years as an analyst with the Austock Group, as a resources analyst. Hillcoat has a BSc Honors in Geology from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg and an MBA from Curtin University of Technology. Investec recently revised their buy rating price target for Wolf Minerals Limited to 29.4p down from 31.6p.

Tungsten Investing News recently talked with Hillcoat regarding his coverage of Wolf Minerals. Wolf trades on the London exchange under WLFE and on the ASX under WLF.

Tungsten Investing News:  Your target price for Wolf dropped very slightly despite the company’s recent positive