Iron Ore Exploration February 2016

Iron Ore Exploration Around the World FEBRUARY 2016 At a time when many iron mining companies are freezing expenditures or cutting back on new operations, some bold miners have decided to put more chips on the table and open up resource extraction in fresh regions of the globe.

Some of the most promising iron mining exploration sites in 2016 may even be found under the sea rather than upon dry land, where a revolution in mining is being played out within the waves.

Nautilus Takes Delivery

No company has as much of a stake in underwater mining as Nautilus Minerals, a company that hopes to push the boundaries of wealth extraction to new heights ‐‐ or rather, new lows. Nautilus has taken a key step forward for 2016 projects by taking delivery of Seafloor Production Tools (SPT) produced by the UK's Soil Machine Dynamics. Nautilus will test out the SPTs off of the coast of Oman, then send the machines to the Pacific Ocean in order to work on the Solwara Joint 1 Venture taking place in the Bismarck Sea near New Guinea.

CEO Mike Johnston noted that the delivery of the SPTs represented a major step forward for his company as the machines will be used in the production phase for Solwara as soon as they clear testing in Oman. Nautilus already acquired the mineral rights for the Solwara project but also prospectable exploration within the western and central Pacific, including within international waters.

Iranian Investment

The lifting of the Iranian sanctions by the international community had major repercussions for the oil market as Iran began to unload more and more crude onto a saturated market. The same may be true of other metal commodities given that the Iranians have signed a five‐billion‐dollar mining exploration and prospecting deal with Italian metal firms. These deals, being put into place by Iranian president Hassan Rhouhani as he begins an historic visit through Europe, will provide the financing for a steel production chain of southern Iran where iron mining leads to secondary production.

In addition to the interest in iron, the Iranian trade minister hopes to secure technical cooperation with French interests for downstream aluminum projects.

All told, the iron interests are just a fraction of the thirty billion dollar Iranian mining sector that authorities want to open up to outside investment and prospecting, which at peak output would bring in nearly as much revenue as the nation's abundant oil exports. Prior to international sanctions, Iran shipped around fifteen to twenty million tons of iron ore per year.

Australian Exploration

Few nations have been hit harder by the end of the mining boom than Australia, where the nation toes a delicate line between recessions and unemployment given the fact that over two percent of the population works in the sector. The Queensland Government has decided that they will make every effort to not just help mining companies get back on their feet, but discover rich new sources of metal to increase the workflow. Queensland minister Anthony Lynham successfully negotiated a reduction in the expenditure requirements for private mineral exploration throughout the state.

Eligible mining interests can now reduce the total costs of permit expenditures by as much as fifty percent, which Lynham and other ministers hope will help to maintain cash flow for companies interested in seeking out new deposits.

Australia's Association of Mining and Exploration Companies (AMEC) released a

statement congratulating the minister on his foresight while also urging other Australian states to adopt the measure in order to remain competitive. Ever since the 2010 discovery of the Hawkwood iron reserves in Queensland, the state has been the most productive in a nation that annually generates about fifty billion dollars of iron, second only to China.