Some want a robust gold industry in Nova Scotia. Others say good riddance
CBC
A year after Nova Scotia's only active gold mine shut down, people in the industry say the provincial government is standing in the way of eager prospectors.
Others, including environmentalists and Mi'kmaq, are opposed to any new mines and are hoping the closure marks the end of the province's long history of gold production.
St Barbara, an Australian firm, is the main player in Nova Scotia's modern gold rush. The company owns the Touquoy mine, which operated from 2017 to 2023, and the company has a vision for three more open-pit gold mines along the Eastern Shore.
But Andrew Strelein, the CEO and managing director of St Barbara, said all of those projects are halted indefinitely.
"We want to be investing in Nova Scotia," said Strelein. "We like Nova Scotia."
But he's worried about roadblocks.
"The only difficulty that we've really encountered in Nova Scotia is dealing with the Department of Environment," he said in a recent interview in Halifax.
Strelein's complaint is rooted in the recent designation of the Archibald Lake Wilderness Area.
St Barbara had intended to draw water from Archibald Lake for its proposed Cochrane Hill mine, but with the whole body of water under protection, that's no longer allowed. As a result, the company threw out its design and has gone back to the drawing board.
Strelein believes the department made the designation with the intent of stopping the project.
Based on documents he received under access to information, which he shared with CBC, it appears that initial boundaries for a wilderness area excluded Archibald Lake. The first reference to including Archibald Lake in the wilderness area appears in 2019, a year after the company publicly released its plans.
"Suddenly this was launched without any consultation, even knowing that our project was going to be impacted so severely," Strelein said.
CBC requested comment from the Department of Environment and Climate Change and it did not respond by deadline.
Strelein is now looking for some kind of assurance that the same thing won't happen again with a revised design for Cochrane Hill, and for two other mines — Fifteen Mile Stream and Beaver Dam.
