This tiny US mining town began burning 52 years ago and never stopped

#tarsands #oilSANDS http://twurl.nl/ik6z8h.” The link will get you to a page on API’s website on oil sands. What caught Brant’s attention was at first that all these tweets were identical and posted at the same time. Later on came more

BHP Billiton today announced approval of a US$437 million (BHP Billiton share) investment to expand the Cerrejon Coal mine in La Guajira, Colombia. BHP Billiton’s investment represents one third of the US$1,311 million expansion to be undertaken by Cerrejon Coal, with joint venture partners Anglo American and Xstrata contributing equal investment in the project. The expansion, known as the P40 Project, will enable Cerrejon Coal’s saleable thermal coal production to increase by 8 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) to approximately 40mtpa.

Tensions over mining and coal seam gas (CSG) exploration have boiled over at a mining conference in Sydney, with activists warning rural NSW could soon resemble an industrial wasteland. As industry heavyweights gathered to discuss the future of mining at

Kazakhstan, strategically placed between China and Russia, has a wealth of mineral riches which it is eager to profit from. While Kazakhstan is probably best known for its oil, changes are on the horizon as mining companies flow in searching for copper, gold, zinc and other natural resources.

Chile is proceeding with a massive coal mine on an island in Patagonia near the southern tip of South America despite a high-profile viral video protest campaign and accusations that billionaire President Sebastian Pinera's shareholding in the developer Copec constitutes a serious conflict of interest. A similar campaign last year forced Pinera to reconsider a thermoelectric plant close to another wildlife attraction and a recent poll put his approval rating at only 26%, below even that of dictator General Pinochet, who ruled the country for 17 years from 1973.

Fast-disappearing Oilsands Quest is a prime example of the risks of trying to go it alone in the oil sands. Slack crude prices and a sluggish US economy may now force other small players into mergers and reverse a slowdown in oil sands deals that have plunged 63% this year to $8.5 billion worth of transactions.

Global miner BHP Billiton is looking to build a new rail line between some of its inland Australian coal mines and the coast in a move that could threaten dominant coal haulage firm QR National, a newspaper said on Thursday.

An Edmonton court was told on Wednesday that Norwegian energy giant Statoil will admit to some environmental infractions in relation to water use at its oil sands operations in northern Alberta. The news comes on the same day that the state-owned company announces a North Sea oil field discovery with total yield of between 500 million and 1.2 billion barrels of oil, making it the largest discovery there in 30 years. Around 70 oilfields are in production on the Norwegian continental shelf, producing some 2.1 million barrels per day. Canada's oil sands produce 1.5 million bpd, a figure that is expected to more than double by the end of the decade.

A day after news of an onerous new mining royalty and taxation regime in Peru, Namibia, the world’s biggest miner of offshore diamonds and a top four uranium producer, drops plans for a huge jump in the corporate tax rate for miners and mineral export levies. Deputy Finance Minister Calle Schlettwein said on Wednesday, the country has withdrawn a proposal to increase the tax on non-diamond miners to 44% from 37.5% and will instead propose a windfall tax when international prices for the commodities are high. Namibia was one of 25 countries around the world that recently announced their intentions to increase their take of the mining industry’s profits or impose ownership and other restrictions.