The not-so-unexpected return of Sio Silica

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 29/07/2024 (438 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s right there, in black and white. Well, actually in full colour, and in video, too.

If you’re looking for an explanation for why Sio Silica is making another attempt to curry favour for a major silica mining project in this province, the information is all right there on the company’s website.

“Sio is the largest high purity sand resource in Canada, and arguably the world, on its 100 per cent controlled mineral rights. Our deposit is one of the highest purity silica dioxide (SiO2) quartz sands that consistently tests well below the maximum allows impurities such as iron and aluminum. Our end product after processing will be of 99.9 per cent SiO2 purity,” Sio’s website says. “The company has secured a total of 459 mining claims, which covers over 100,000 hectares of land.”

The fact is that the sand project is the company’s only project — there’s no other set of mineral claims, no other place for the venture to focus on.

The company had expected to be much further ahead than it is now, having planned to start preconstruction planning for its production facility in the last quarter of 2023.

It had also found a corporate partner and was expecting to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

Premier Wab Kinew’s government changed all that, obviously, by not approving what the company calls its patent-pending unique system to mine the silica sand. A big selling point in the company’s promotional material was how environmentally friendly Sio claimed its extraction process would be — no large mine, no trucking of silica, instead, pumping a water/silica slurry out from underground.

Environmental concerns, however, were raised about the effects of the pumping on underground aquifers.

The company said the decision was made for political reasons, but chose not to appeal it.

Now, Sio Silica is making another try to develop its leases — the president and chief executive officer of the Calgary-based firm, Feisal Somji, confirmed the effort was underway after the Free Press asked about a presentation the company had made to members of the Brokenhead First Nation on July 21.

No one should be surprised that Sio Silica is pitching a new form of the project..

How could they not? There’s just too much at stake for the company. The Manitoba Prospectors and Developers Association has argued that there is four times more silica sand in this province than there is potash in Saskatchewan, and that silica sand sells for more than twice as much per tonne than potash.

You could make the case is being made that silica projects are too big to fail — or at least too big for a cash-starved provincial government to ignore.

And Sio Silica has a huge portion of that resource as effectively its sole asset.

Truth is, Sio Silica is welcome to make a new case for the project whose approval is central to their very existence.

Meanwhile, the same questions have to be asked about the project that were asked the last time it was presented. At what price does development go ahead? What does it take for the venture to be acceptable, both economically and environmentally? Is there full, meaningful and detailed consultation with Indigenous groups? Is the province satisfied that the mining method, whatever it may be next, is demonstrably safe for the province’s people, wildlife and aquifers?

That’s the very beginning.

There may, in fact, be some middle ground that eventually makes the project acceptable.

But we haven’t seen it yet, and there’s a long and careful road ahead before we even get close to that point.