With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/838617
ISTOCK JULY/AUGUST 2017 BCBUSINESS 93 Mine, its new gold and copper concern in far northwestern B.C. Thanks to a steady increase in output at that mine— it generated $293.3 million in revenue in 2016—and the full reopening of Mount Polley in June 2016, Imperial's produc- tion of copper increased from 58.5 to 83.6 million pounds between 2015 and last year. Its gold output almost doubled, from 25,949 ounces to 47,088. Teck Resources Ltd. REVENUE CHANGE: 12.6% NET INCOME: $1.04 billion NET INCOME CHANGE: NA Teck Resources is the world's second- largest seaborne exporter of steelmak- ing coal, so the Vancouver mining company's bottom line is directly linked to China, its biggest market. In 2016, after a multiyear downward trend in steelmaking coal prices, demand took a sharp turn upward. Although Teck owns a mix of 13 coal, zinc, copper and oilsands operations in North and South America, its reve- nue gains last year came entirely from its coal business. Prices that started at a low of US$74 a tonne in February 2016 reached US$300 by November. That surge came as the company boosted production from 25.3 mil- lion to 27.6 million tonnes. The result: record sales, with coal revenue from Teck's Kootenay mines $1.1 billion higher in 2016 than the year before. Westshore Terminals Investment Corp. REVENUE CHANGE: –11.3% NET INCOME: $135 million NET INCOME CHANGE: –4.7% A lump of steelmaking coal and a lump of thermal coal may look alike, but as commodities they behave in remark- ably di–erent ways. For Westshore Ter- minals Investment Corp., owner of the largest coal loading facility on the west coast of North America, those di–er- ences matter. Thanks in part to slacken- ing demand from Japanese and South Korean power utilities, Westshore's thermal coal shipments fell from 9.1 million to 6.3 million tonnes between 2015 and last year. And there's another threat on the horizon: Christy Clark's electoral promise to ban the transship- ment of U.S. thermal coal through B.C. would have a big impact on Westshore if it became policy. The other side of Westshore's business, steelmaking coal, has remained more lucrative and less controversial. The company shipped 25.8 million tonnes of it in 2016, down 10 per cent from 28.8 million the year before, partly due to construction at its Delta facility, which has temporar- ily reduced export capacity. Once the terminal expansion wraps up in 2019, Westshore will be able to ship three million more tonnes a year. Westcoast Energy Inc. REVENUE CHANGE: –10.3% NET INCOME: $268 million NET INCOME CHANGE: –6.9% With a network of natural gas pipelines crisscrossing B.C. and Alberta, Westcoast Ener›y specializes in transporting gas from well to market. HOT COMMODITY B.C. mining companies have benefited from the high price of steelmaking coal Your company relies on a complicated digital infrastucture from multiple vendors. Our new Transit bundles can save you up to 40% by combining it all in one package. One package means one partner to turn to for local support, knowing that issues can be resolved with a single call.