With zinc sources drying up and demand forecast to surge,
resource-hungry China is looking to Canada to approve two giant
mines and close the gap — but environmentalists and roving
caribou stand in the way. There are rich deposits to be had at
the Izok and High lakes in Nunavut, in Canada’s Arctic
territory, with companies anxious to build the transport links
and infrastructure needed to extract the bluish-gray element and
move it out. An Australian subsidiary of Chinese state-owned
Minmetals Resources has proposed that two multibillion-dollar
mines be built and the Canadian government is considering
granting regulatory approval for the project. The plan would
involve the partial draining of several lakes to access vast
zinc deposits, building dams to divert water, as well as the
construction of an airstrip and a port at Grays Bay on the
central Arctic coast. Hundreds of kilometers of roads and more
than 60 bridges would complete the project. Ships would access
the port through the Northwest Passage. However,