Richest Deposits Are Where They Are For A Reason If Storm was off the coast of Vancouver or PEI, it woudl have been mined years ago. However, it is not. It is where it is which is the middle of nowhere.
The worlds richest deposits remain in the worlds most inaccessible locations. This is a fact of economics. AS prices improve and the world runs out of material, it become economic to mine in more remote locations.
This poses two questions for Storm; 1> it is a large enough, rich enough deposit to mine EVER. 2> It large enough, rich enough NOW
I dont believe they have yet priven up enough reources to establish a mine - anywhere. Drilling is how to find more reources and that what they are diong now- god speed.
However it is the second question that shareholders in Aston and Western really need to get a grasp on. Where is this deposit on the copper cost curve? Is it in the bottom quartile for production costs (good) or it is in the top quartile (not good) - OR perhaps it is not even mineable at a profit (my suspicion).
IN my estimation, most do not understand how the location of this resource affects the mining cost. BHP walked away from Hope Bay (huge gold resource). They gave it to Newmont, who pumped $1B in and the THEY walked away. The new owners have not been able to mine open pit gold at 8g/t profitably. This shoudl give those investing in jr mining in the artic some pause.