In a bid to make underground coal mines safe as well as efficient, the government plans to phase out manual equipment within a year.

The decision was taken at the 30th meeting of the standing committee on safety of coal mines today. “This will help in efficient mining and ensure safety of labourers,” a government official said.

Dasari Narayana Rao, minister of state for coal and the chairman of the committee, urged Coal India Ltd (CIL) and private companies to adopt the concept of “zero harm” in coal mining and ensure good safety systems and practices for those working in mines.

Meanwhile, the Directorate General of Mines Safety (DGMS) will evolve fresh guidelines for risk assessment of all 560 mines of CIL within three months . Read more

Oil and gas futures prices retreated Tuesday on expectations that a government inventory report on Wednesday will again show that crude and gasoline stocks rose last week.

The weekly report by the Energy Department’s Energy Information Administration has become critical for analysts and traders during a spring and early summer that have seen an unusually high number of refinery outages. Those refinery problems have been widely cited by analysts as the reason for record gas prices, and high oil and gasoline futures prices.

An increase in inventories in Wednesday’s report could take some air out of the futures market, analysts said.

“People are trying to hit the exit door before these numbers come out tomorrow,” said James Cordier, president of Liberty Trading Group in Tampa, Fla. Read more

Suriname will let mining companies pursue excavation projects in an eastern jungle region where scientists recently discovered two dozen new species of wildlife, the environment minister said Wednesday.

Joyce Amarello Williams said the government will take measures to protect wildlife diversity while encouraging investment in gold and bauxite exploration and open-pit mining in the small South American nation.

“It is a matter of finding a right and responsible balance between exploiting our natural resources to our benefit and preserving our biodiversity, which is an important part of our wealth,” she told The Associated Press. Read more

WALLACE, IDAHO, — /CNW/ — Sterling Mining Company (OTCBB: SRLM) today reported that Sterling crews are preparing for continued development of an exploration cross-cut, at an elevation of 2,672 feet, east of the historic Polaris Mine workings in the upper mine area of the Sunshine Mine.

The cross-cut’s advance was interrupted briefly upon the completion of the Sterling Tunnel Project to allow geologists to map and evaluate newly exposed structures and make a smooth transition from contractor to in-house mining. The cross-cut is designed to probe unexplored projections of the Sunshine vein system east of the known production areas and, at the same time, provide a platform for diamond drilling into the Yankee Girl vein some 1,200 feet south of the Sunshine system. Zones of alteration and mineralization have been identified and are being studied to guide exploration efforts.
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As the Securities and Exchange Commission weighs letting U.S.-based companies file their financial statements using other countries’ accounting standards, here’s an open secret: Some already do. And this can have magical effects on their numbers.

Consider Tanzanian Royalty Exploration Corp., a gold-mining company based in Sharon, Connecticut, that issues lots of press releases but has no revenue or proven mineral reserves. Though its shares trade on the American Stock Exchange, it files its financial reports with the SEC using Canada’s version of generally accepted accounting principles. By those standards, Tanzanian showed C$24.9 million ($22.6 million) of assets in its last annual report.

Under U.S. GAAP, all but C$11.2 million of those assets disappear. We know this only because the SEC now requires Tanzanian to show its financial results under both methods. In a couple years or so, if the SEC has its way, the company won’t have to report U.S. GAAP figures at all. Read more

LONDON — /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Central African Mining & Exploration Company Plc, the AIM listed fully integrated exploration, mining, trading and investment company, is pleased to announce that Mr. Andrew Burns has agreed to join its Board of Directors as Chief Financial Officer by no later than 31 August 2007.

Mr. Burns has over 20 years’ financial experience working across various sectors in the corporate arena. He trained as a Chartered Accountant for Price Waterhouse Cooper, after which he had various directorships with both private and public companies. Most recently he was Chief Financial Officer of AIM listed company, Livermore Investments Group Limited, prior to which he was Finance Director of the FTSE 250 company, Luminar plc. He was also Senior Executive Business Development of the media group, Rank Group plc, and a Non-executive Director for the AIM listed investment group, Inflexion plc. Read more

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA — /Marketwire/ — True North Gems (TSX VENTURE:TGX) is pleased to announce that the Company’s shareholders supported management’s recommendations during voting at the True North Gems’ Annual General Meeting held in Vancouver on June 22, 2007.

Among the resolutions approved was the election of Directors, a slate which included Robert Boyd, former President of Ashton Mining as a new member of the Board.

For the coming year, True North Gems Board of Directors will be:

Andrew Lee Smith, P. Geo.

Mr. Smith has 20 years of experience successfully exploring, developing and operating North American base and precious metal mining projects. Mr. Smith is the president of Iron Mask Read more