Wall Street Journal - Greenland Wall Street Journal just happened to put out an article on mining in Greenland today:
WSJ: Race for Resources – Warm to Investors, Greenland Opens Up
Prospectors Develop Projects to Mine Potential Bounty in Minerals
JAMES T. AREDDY
ILULIALIK FIORD, Greenland—Geologists have long known that deep beneath the forbidding ice of this Arctic island lay buried treasure.
Below hundreds of feet of frozen water and ground, iron, copper, nickel, zinc, rare-earth minerals and rubies beckon. Oil and gas may sit offshore.
Fortune hunters taste opportunity. Prospectors from various countries, encouraged by Greenland's investment-friendly policies, have spent over $1.7 billion developing potential projects. A British company is going for iron ore. Scots are testing for undersea oil. Australians are pursuing rare earths. Canadians are digging for rubies, while giant Chinese mining and engineering concerns are jockeying for position.
In Greenland, the Arctic is in play.
Recent annual thaws make it possible for the Danish territory to contemplate exploiting these riches, even though the 56,000 people who live on the world's biggest island lack the means to build the ports, roads and power plants required to transform the fishing-based economy into a mining one.
Greenland's geologists had found many resources on the largely pristine island but never much pursued mining. Then, in 2009 Denmark freed the island to largely govern itself, permitting locals to decide how best to use the land. Greenland's ethnic Inuit welcomed mineral and petroleum investors as new patrons.CLICK HERE TO READ MORE