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I was reading a technical report on this project. It appears the Copperwood Mine plans are to use the CN White Pine Sub located at Thomaston about 11 miles from the Project via County Road 519. There is an existing loading station at Thomaston which is used for timber, they would make upgrades to county road 519 to handle mine truck traffic.

The prefeasibility study is due out in June. Copperwood Mine Project was about a 10 year mine life but with the S6 copper findings this would lengthen the mine life or make for an expansion – that is being studied at this moment.

Copperwood Mine project is located in the western part of the Upper Peninsula 18 miles southwest of the inactive White Pine Mine where over 1.7 million tonnes of copper and over 4.5 million ounces of silver were produced between 1953 and 1996.

Does CN still stage the local at Thomaston? Besides the ex-White Pine traffic what other customers are on this segment?

Last time I heard they have not been running to Thomaston much at all this winter. No trains are assigned to the sub any more. When they have ran into Thomaston power was used off the Ashland Sub. As far as traffic Thomaston is it with pulpwood and at times they ship Iron Ore. White Pine was the only customer past Thomaston. I think everyone that followed this sub expected CN to abandon. This Copperwood Mine is still several years off till they would start shipping.

AARR wrote:Does CN still stage the local at Thomaston? Besides the ex-White Pine traffic what other customers are on this segment?

It's a better deal for the mine, less trucking distance and therefore fewer trucks needed. I was afraid CN would jack the price up vs. a Mellen loadout so CN could save a crew turn plus maintenence of the WP Sub but still get a long haul of the ore to whatever the destination is. Running the trucks through all the towns to Mellen would also trash the roads even more than they are and likely cause the mine grief with those places, another reason for them to push for the Thomaston loadout.

blackjack1518 wrote:Last time I heard they have not been running to Thomaston much at all this winter. No trains are assigned to the sub any more. When they have ran into Thomaston power was used off the Ashland Sub. As far as traffic Thomaston is it with pulpwood and at times they ship Iron Ore. White Pine was the only customer past Thomaston. I think everyone that followed this sub expected CN to abandon. This Copperwood Mine is still several years off till they would start shipping.

AARR wrote:Does CN still stage the local at Thomaston? Besides the ex-White Pine traffic what other customers are on this segment?

Would you mind posting the link to the "technical document?"
Those things always greatly interest me.

http://www.orvana.com/projects/copperwo ... ports.html

willardgarrett wrote:Would you mind posting the link to the "technical document?"
Those things always greatly interest me.

Thanks "Jack"

I had read that the Copperwood estimate increased M&I tonnage by over 50% and contained copper by about 40% as compared to that used for the September Preliminary Economic Assessment. Produced at 5000 tpd Orvana has over 50 years of ore provided if you use a 5 ft and 1% cutoff parameter. The project has less than 2 year payback at current prices which is absolutely unheard of for such a long lived project. The entire area also has much more additional potential ore feedstock if you reduce the thickness to 1 meter to note that there are continuous miners that can operate in thicknesses as low as 32 inches.


Ideally the project should be produced at 15000 tpd so there likely will be a future ramp up as the project ages. Looks like about 15 year mine life with many more years of potential mining in that area yet to be studied. Prefeasibility study, which is due out in June. So we will see if they lengthen the mine life or do an expansion. So looks like in a couple years granted they get permits to mine CN will be pretty busy in and out of Thomaston with this mine.

I take it east of Thomaston sees little to no traffic without White Pine?

AARR wrote:I take it east of Thomaston sees little to no traffic without White Pine?

CN is using the sub as a as needed basis. Nothing is past Thomaston right now other then maybe pulpwood in Bergland and White Pine. I had heard that something may in be in the works as some kind of ore loading site near the White Pine refinery, not sure what that could be. I think the sub past Thomaston siding will be in place until something happens with the refinery as to being sold or sold and moved.

Things looking good for the CN White Pine sub. Just in the last month the White Pine refinery has sold and today good news from the Copperwood mine project.


TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - June 24, 2011) - Orvana Minerals Corp. (TSX:ORV - News), through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Orvana Resources US Corp ("Orvana USA"), announces today the highlights of their 43-101-compliant Prefeasibility Study for the Copperwood copper project, Upper Peninsula, Michigan, USA. The study contemplates a 14-year underground operation that applies both conventional drill-and-blast and mechanized methods to room-and-pillar mining and develops a detailed mine plan for each. The fully-diluted mineable reserves using conventional drill-and-blast methods with 50% pillar recovery, which is considered the base case, are 24.9 million short tons of 1.37% copper and 4.2 ppm silver proven and 5.1 million short tons of 1.11% copper and 2.8 ppm silver probable, for a total of 30.0 million short tons of 1.33% copper (798 million pounds) and 3.9 ppm silver (3.46 million ounces). The table below is a summary of the financial results.

Thanks for the updates blackjack.

I am not sure how to read those numbers but a million tons equals about 10,000 car loads so it looks like there wil be some nice business for CN.

AARR wrote:Thanks for the updates blackjack.

I am not sure how to read those numbers but a million tons equals about 10,000 car loads so it looks like there wil be some nice business for CN.

I'm not sure how much concentrate they would produce out of that 30 million short tons with a 23% copper grade concentrate.

blackjack1518 wrote:I'm not sure how much concentrate they would produce out of that 30 million short tons with a 23% copper grade concentrate.

If I am doing this right that is 6.9 million tons of concentrate which if all goes by rail equals 69,000 tons over 14 years equals approximately 5,000 cars per year or 100 cars per week.

AARR wrote:

blackjack1518 wrote:I'm not sure how much concentrate they would produce out of that 30 million short tons with a 23% copper grade concentrate.

If I am doing this right that is 6.9 million tons of concentrate which if all goes by rail equals 69,000 tons over 14 years equals approximately 5,000 cars per year or 100 cars per week.

That's a lot of traffic for that old 80 pound rail...More upgrades to that rail would be needed with only a 10 mph limit. Last upgrades WCL in 1997 and in 2008 CN completed comprehensive maintenance to main line.

Orvana is pleased to report the receipt of the mining permit for the Copperwood copper project from the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. Good news for the CN White Pine sub! I Shall be watching to see if CN starts to build any type of load-out site at Thomaston in the next year.


http://www.orvana.com/news/pdf/120430.pdf

Great news! Thanks for keeping us posted.

New customer on the White Pine sub in the near future. Not sure if this would generate much or any rail business for CN.


WHITE PINE - Global Wood Sticks LLC has entered into a deal to purchase the former Custom Metals building in the White Pine industrial park.

The company is operated by Ted K. Lee, chairman of the Korean-American Chamber of Commerce of Georgia, according to a news release.

The plan is to produce wood products to be marketed overseas, including chopsticks. It will be the first plant of its kind in Michigan to manufacture custom-sized wood products from local Michigan forests and send them overseas, according to the release.

The company will operate 58 machines, a sawmill and employ from 70 to 80 local people in the first year.

Initial contact was made with the Ontonagon County Planning Commission, and details were organized by the Ontonagon County Economic Partnership Members and president Frank Wardynski.

blackjack1518 wrote:New customer on the White Pine sub in the near future. Not sure if this would generate much or any rail business for CN.

Unless the chop sticks are for Godzilla they probably won't have much need for rail service

AARR wrote:

blackjack1518 wrote:New customer on the White Pine sub in the near future. Not sure if this would generate much or any rail business for CN.

Unless the chop sticks are for Godzilla they probably won't have much need for rail service

Perhaps some inbound logs. The products are for export, so containers will be used. I see containers loaded at the plant being trucked to the intermodal terminal.