CAT LAKE — By Dan Wilton’s reckoning, there could be a new gold mine on the shore of Springpole Lake by 2030.
Wilton, chief executive officer of First Mining Gold, said in an interview that a recently completed environmental impact statement should clear the path for construction to start in 2027.
Construction of the open-pit mine approximately 110 kilometres northeast of Red Lake could be done 2.5 years after it starts, he said.
The environmental impact statement is “the culmination of about 14 years of environmental study and work on this project,” Wilton told Newswatch.
The document is thousands of pages long and “covers really all aspects of the potential environmental impacts of the project,” he said, before adding there’s “still a lot of important work to do.”
The next major milestone is getting environmental assessment approval, hopefully by the end of 2025, he said.
After that, he estimated, construction could start in 2027 and be completed in 2030 if all goes well.
The Springpole project, touted by First Mining as “one of the largest undeveloped gold projects in Ontario,” is on traditional territory of the Cat Lake and Lac Seul First Nations.
Last month, the Vancouver-headquartered mining company entered into a process agreement with Cat Lake and Lac Seul for a community-based impact assessment.
The process agreement provides a framework the company and the First Nations to proceed with “procedural clarity and meaningful participation in the review of the Springpole Gold Project,” according to an October news release from First Mining.
The First Nations acknowledged receipt of the environmental impact statement in a Nov. 12 letter to First Mining, federal and provincial officials.
Cat Lake and Lac Seul will complete a “sufficiency review” of the document by the end of January under their Kita-ki-nan (“Our Land”) process, the letter states.
The First Nations “will continue to the next phase and conduct a fulsome Anishinaabe review” if the impact statement is deemed sufficient, the letter says.
“As a final comment,” Cat Lake and Lac Seul say in their letter, they “remain deeply concerned by the expedited assessment process being championed by Canada and Ontario.
“For our capacity-limited communities, which have so much on their plates, being asked to speed up to meet the desires of Canada, Ontario and (First Mining) is not acceptable.”
Wilton said First Mining is “proud to be supporting” the First Nations so that they can “look at the project through an Indigenous lens.”
