Green light on expansion of Baffinland's Mary River mine 'critical,' company says

The next five days of hearings under the Nunavut Impact Review Board could prove critical to the future of the Mary River iron mine.

Baffinland, which owns the mine, is looking to come out of the review in Iqaluit with a positive recommendation for its Phase 2 expansion. This could lead to the federal northern affairs minister to grant a new project certificate to the mine, with conditions.

If not, the Mary River mine could be shuttered, put into care and maintenance, said Megan Lord-Hoyle, Baffinland Iron Mines Corp.'s vice-president of sustainable development, who spent Monday fending off technical questions from the NIRB and intervenors during the first day of the six days of meetings in Iqaluit.

"This process has been unexpectedly long," Lord-Hoyle told CBC, referring to the postponements and cancellations of the key review hearings on the mine's expansion, most recently last April due to COVID-19 in Iqaluit.

"We will be looking at moving into a care and maintenance scenario," Lord-Hoyle told the meeting if the expansion stalls at the permitting stage.

The goal of the Phase 2 expansion is to up the mine's production to 30 million tonnes of iron ore a year and by doing that, lure investors keen to sink up to $1.3 billion in the mine's development.

For the proposed expansion, shareholders would be asked to invest between $1.2 billion and $1.3 billion, according to a credit report on Baffinland, prepared by Moody's Investors Service.

The growth involves the construction of a 110-kilometre railway, a new port at Steensby Inlet and a growth in shipping to 176 huge iron-ore carriers a year.

That would give Baffinland a "competitive advantage" in the world market, Lord-Hoyle said, and give the company the leverage it needs to raise the money and "unlock the whole project."

The mine would then become "a world-class operation."

But there are unresolved issues, which will be raised during the community roundtable discussions slated to run until Saturday morning.

This will see members of the communities of Pond Inlet, Arctic Bay, Sanirajak, Igloolik and Clyde River, raising their concerns about the project to NIRB and Baffinland's team led by Iqaluit-raised Udlu Hanson, now a vice-president at the mining company.

Meanwhile, Baffinland continues to emphasize the benefits to communities on sheets distributed in Inuktitut and English: for example in Pond Inlet, which, unlike Arctic Bay, Grise Fiord and Sanirajak, is not supportive of the project, it lists $16 million from the mine in wages since 2015, with 46 employees out of 286 employees at the mine and $15 million awarded to Inuit firms based in Pond Inlet.

Phase 2 benefits for the community are also touted: additional jobs, a community daycare, a Baffinland office, $10-million training centre and community garage as well as a continuing flow of money to various community funds and programs through the Inuit Impact and Benefit agreements.