Quiet BB Day...some thoughts...
It's been a pretty quiet day on this BB (for a change), so I thought I'd post something that's been puzzling me for a couple of days. It involves the wording in a couple of NR's for those good ol' "Comfort Letters".
excerpt from NAG's NR of June 9th:
"....of the coal permit applications processed to date, on behalf of North American Gem Inc., 415,434 acres of issued Coal Prospecting Permits (CPP) will be given priority sequence in our area of interest...."
and this excerpt from WCU's NR of June 10th:
"The 'Comfort Letter' received by Westcan confirms that half of permits applied for are 'first in line' and will be given priority sequence."
What puzzles me is that there is room for interpretation in both of these statements. I know that each of these companies applied for permits on more than one occasion. One interpretation could be that Sask E & R has given a priority sequence to the entire 'first batch' of applications submitted to them by each Company, and that priority sequence for other subsequent submitted applications will be made in due course. In that case, a further Comfort Letter(s) would be forthcoming. CD had mentioned that he thought that NAG could get more than one Comfort Letter in his interview with Andrew Racz on June 5th.
Using the WCU statement as an example; that would mean that half of the total permits they applied for were done on May 8th, and the other half were done on May 12th. Therefore Sask E & R is essentially telling them that "we've received all of your permit applications, and we've been able to approve only your May 8th applications for priority status at this time. We'll send you another Comfort Letter in the near future regarding your May 12th applications."
Again using the WCU example, another interpretation could be simply this: Sask E & R is saying that "we've received all of your permit applications dated May 8th and May 12th, but we're only giving you priority status for half of them. Sorry, but that's all. You made some errors (or whatever) on the other half of your applications and they can't be given priority status".
For Westcan, it's my feeling that if their NR is indeed accurate, then for quite a number of reasons I would be subscribing to the second interpretation. Not the least of which is the fact that nowhere in their NR does it state that they expect to receive another Comfort Letter. I know each company is responsible for the content of their NR's and that they use smoke & mirrors all the time. I'm just not sure how much they're obligated (and how well they're regulated) to provide reliable, truthful, and accurate information.
There's a lot more descriptive information in the NAG NR, and I've certainly got some opinions about that one too. But I'll not carry on any further because it's quite likely one of you fine people may be able to post a comment to enlighten me about some of this. I know that it's been said a number of times that these Comfort Letters don't mean much; but it's my thought (right now at least) that they could mean quite a bit. That's why I'm feeling a bit puzzled at the moment.
I've got a variety of thoughts about all of this, but I hope that somebody can post some of their own thoughts and ideas in order to help me understand more of this.
TIA