General Magnesium Corporation and Abbey Gold will be meeting next week to complete negotiations on a contract that will have the gold mining company milling magnesium, talc and magnetite from GMC’s mining site in Whitney Township.
The agreement between GMC and Abbey Gold was originally announced in November, 2015, but still has not been formally concluded by the two parties.
“We will be meeting with General Magnesium next week to complete the signing of the agreement,” said Harry Quint, chair of Abbey Gold in a telephone interview with TimminsToday.com
“It’s pretty well completed,” Quint added. “There are a few details to go over before we sign the agreement."
The delay in concluding the agreement may be related to a health setback for GMC chair and CEO, William Quesnel in January.
Along with the delay in finalizing the agreement, GMC’s offices in Porcupine were temporarily closed throughout February.
GMC is part of The Quesnel Group, a family-owned and operated private corporation with William Quesnel as chair and CEO and son Ryan Quesnel the president and chief operating officer.
For more information on GMC and The Quesnel Group click here
Many in Timmins are hopeful that GMC’s operation will create employment to offset the recent job loss due to the Dome Underground Mine closure and the impending closure of Kidd Creek in 2021.
In early November, 2015 William Quesnel announced the signing of two deals that would assure the production of magnesium, talc and magnetite for the next 15 years.
The first, signed on November 1, 2015 was with Hunter Douglas Metals. The deal was for a reported $4.9 billion to provide Hunter Douglas, a manufacturer of hard plastic products (plastic window blinds) with a supply of magnesium for the next 15 years.
GMC has a stockpile of about 50,000 tonnes of ore containing magnesium, talc and magnetite during its advanced exploration stage. Processing of the ore and delivery to Hunter Douglas Metal could start by June, 2016, according to William Quesnel’s statement last November.
In mid-November, Quesnel announced the signing of a second agreement with Abbey Gold for processing the ore.
A third deal announced by Quesnel was with investment firm Haywood Securities to transition GMC into a public share corporation with its shares publicly.
GMC plans to hold a job fair in the first quarter of 2016 to fill up to 200 positions for its June 2016 start-up. Over the life span of the magnesium-talc operations 1,000 jobs could be generated, according to past statements made by William Quesnel.
Geological reports developed for the Quesnel Group said its Whitney Township property has enough magnesium, talc and magnetite resources to last 100 years.
The vastness of the supply and the demand for more energy efficient automobiles built increasingly with lighter, hard plastic products could turn Timmins into an economic cluster for magnesium-talc based auto parts.
According to GMC’s NI 43-101 resource estimate documentation, its site in Whitney Township contains about 100 million tonnes of magnesium, with 54,076,357 tonnes in the measured and indicated category, and 43,000,000 tonnes in the inferred category.
Quesnel grew up in Timmins and has a degree in geology from the University of Waterloo.
He has worked at Kidd Creek in Timmins and with LAC Minerals (now Barrick Gold). He has also worked in Nicaragua, Argentina, Venezuela and Chile.
The Timmins area has a long history of uninterrupted talc production from the Penhorwood Mine located West of Timmins previously owned by international mining giant, Rio Tinto and which is now operated by Imerys Talc.
