I. Public Geological Survey and Division of Work
The geological work of the government is mainly undertaken by the Canadian Geological Survey and the provincial geological surveys or corresponding institutions. There is no affiliation between the two departments. Basically, work is arranged in the form of a contract. The Geological Survey of Canada has a clear division of labor and cooperation with geological survey institutions in various provinces and regions. 1996 September 17, Canada's Ministry of Natural Resources and the ministers of energy and minerals of various provinces and regions signed the Agreement of the Intergovernmental Division of Geological Sciences. In this agreement, the tasks, responsibilities, cooperation principles, cooperation mechanisms and obligations of the Geological Survey of Canada and the geological survey institutions of various provinces and regions are defined.
According to the agreement, the Geological Survey of Canada is mainly responsible for undertaking national or large-scale research projects and international geoscience cooperation projects, studying Canada's geology and resources, and coordinating the work of cross-regional and inter-departmental cooperation projects. These projects serve the whole of Canada, including basic research, geological theory research, small-scale survey (1∶ 250,000 mapping) and marine survey, with emphasis on geological survey of metal minerals, geophysical and geochemical exploration, technology development and information transmission, among which1∶ 250,000 national regional geological survey has been basically completed. Part of the work can be undertaken by universities, scientific research institutions and consulting institutions. These projects do not duplicate the research projects of provincial and regional geological survey institutions. In addition, the Geological Survey of Canada is the only geological survey institution that studies Canadian waters and coasts. The Geological Survey of Canada represents Canada in international earth science exchanges and cooperation.
In addition to participating in some national projects, geological survey institutions in various provinces or regions in Canada are more engaged in projects to promote economic development and resource management in this province or region. The scale is generally determined according to the conditions of resources, environment and land, mostly for small-scale and large-scale special surveying and mapping work. The setting of these projects has fully considered the needs of promoting regional economic development and attracting investment, solicited the opinions of mining companies, directly served the development of commercial geological work, and met the requirements of land use planning in this province or region. Taking British Columbia as an example, 55% of the work funds of the Provincial Geological Survey are used for geological survey, mapping, geochemical survey and research, 40% for database construction, public publication and network construction, and 5% for management fees. Up to now, about 90,000 square kilometers, accounting for1:500,000 and1:250,000, have been completed by the government. The basic geological work in this field used to be fully funded by the government, but now it is jointly funded by the government and enterprises. One is that the government contributes 80% and the enterprise contributes 20%. The other is to contribute 50% each.
Two, the permanent organization to coordinate the province's geological work
In order to effectively manage and coordinate the geological work in this province, some provincial governments have also set up some resident geologist offices at the local level, such as Ontario and Saskatchewan. Among them, Ontario is a large province with resident geologists' offices in 12 regions of the province. Areas vary in size, mainly depending on geological and mineral conditions. Most resident geologists' offices are located in important mining centers, such as Timmins, sudbury and Koboldt. There are not many people in the office, usually two or three. In addition, some temporary staff will be hired every year.
The main task of the resident geologist's office is to provide the public with geological and mineral information of the province (especially the local area) and opinions on related issues. Each resident geologist's office has a reference room, which collects published and unpublished reports, technical documents and monographs, relevant publications of the Geological Survey of Ontario and other government departments, reports on exploration activities, relevant reports of companies, reports of regional geologists or resident geologists' office staff on business trips, and information directly obtained from companies and individuals. Many resident geologists' offices have also established borehole core banks. The establishment of the resident geologist's office is of great significance to coordinate the geological work between enterprises and the government and guide mineral exploration and development.
Three, the government's management of commercial geological work
Commercial geological prospecting work is the main body of geological prospecting work, and public geological prospecting work serves the development of commercial geological prospecting work to a great extent. The better the public geological exploration is done, the larger the scale of commercial geological exploration is, and the lower the proportion of public geological exploration is. The ratio of commonweal geological work to commercial geological work in Canada is about 10: 90. The management of commercial geological work by Canadian Mining Bureau and geological exploration organization and management organization mainly provides services for commercial geological exploration in the following aspects.
1) Mining right management. Mining rights management, such as approval and certification of mining rights, change registration, management of mining rights transfer, management of mining rights royalties and royalties, shall be the responsibility of the mineral management departments of all provinces and autonomous regions.
2) Provide public geological work data. British Columbia and Ontario stipulate that prospectors and miners must submit a work summary to the government every year, and after the work is completed, they must submit an evaluation report including financial statements and geological work to the government registration authority, otherwise the government will revoke the mining rights of investors. The organization and management institutions of mining administration and geological exploration are responsible for collecting data, auditing evaluation reports, inputting them into computer databases, which can be consulted on the Internet, and compiling these data into maps, texts, books and tables (including borehole locations and prospecting results, actual geophysical and geochemical data, reserve level, quantity and grade, etc.). ), and provide the public with free inquiries for a fee.
3) Provide an equal, fair and orderly mining investment environment, so that individual prospectors and small mining companies can effectively protect their mining rights and interests like big companies.
The main bodies of commercial geological prospecting work include large mining companies, small mining companies, small prospecting companies and individual prospectors. According to the classification method of the Canadian Association of Prospectors and Developers, a small prospecting company refers to a mining company that does not engage in mining itself, has no own funds, and mainly relies on financing from the financial market for prospecting. 198, small exploration companies in Canada raised 694 million Canadian dollars for exploration (small exploration companies in other countries raised 203 million Canadian dollars for exploration). Small mining companies refer to mining companies whose annual mining income is less than 50 million Canadian dollars. Exploration funds can be self-owned funds or financing from financial markets. 198, small mining companies in Canada raised 538 million Canadian dollars (small companies in other countries raised 606 million Canadian dollars). A large mining company refers to a mining company whose annual mining income exceeds 50 million Canadian dollars and mainly uses its own funds for prospecting. 1998, Canadian big mining companies raised 2.6 billion Canadian dollars (other big mining companies raised 2.2 billion Canadian dollars). The funds raised by large mining companies and small mining companies are mainly used for mine development, and rarely do predictive prospecting work. Prospecting work is mainly undertaken by small-scale prospecting companies or individual prospectors. After discovering prospecting anomalies or occurrences, they get a return on investment by transferring mining rights to mining companies or other prospecting companies. According to statistics, a mineral exploration right usually needs 7 ~ 10 times to find an economic value. Therefore, small prospecting companies and individual prospectors share the early exploration risks for mining companies and play an important role in mining development. When formulating mining policy, the government should not only consider the interests of large mining companies, but also consider the interests of small prospecting companies or individual prospectors.
Fourth, the support and cooperation between the government and non-governmental forces.
The federal and provincial governments provide financial assistance to enterprises through a series of incentive plans to guide their geological work; Through the government's scientific research institutions, such as the Canadian Geological Survey and the Canadian Mineral Resources Research Center, new technologies are continuously developed and quickly disseminated to enterprises to promote and improve the work level of enterprises; Through the government's information system, we can provide rich geological and mineral information for enterprises and help and guide their geological work.
In order to support small prospecting companies or individual prospectors and encourage prospecting, the federal and provincial governments have formulated some preferential policies, including direct funding to support prospecting. For example, British Columbia allocates hundreds of thousands of Canadian dollars for prospecting every year, and small prospecting companies or individual prospectors can apply to the government. If a project is approved, it can get about 1 ten thousand Canadian dollars, which must be used for the designated geological work and written off according to the workload after the project is completed.
Canadian enterprises also actively participate in scientific research projects of government departments, especially in regional geophysical surveys such as aeromagnetism, gravity and radioactivity. At present, Canada's geophysical exploration technology is in the leading position in the world, which is inseparable from the mutual cooperation between the government and enterprises. In order to promote the development of private enterprises in this field, the Geological Survey of Canada has set up a "government-industry committee" to coordinate the work of both sides.
University geological teachers and students are also a force to be reckoned with in Canadian geological work. They take part in the geological work of the government and enterprises during their holidays every year, which is particularly beneficial to students, not only solving part of the study expenses, but also improving their practical work ability.
At present, many large-scale scientific research projects are actually completed by various social forces. For example, the athabasca uranium mine multidisciplinary research plan led by the Canadian Geological Survey, including the Canadian Geological Survey, Saskatchewan Department of Energy and Minerals, Alberta Geological Survey, COGEMA and Cameco, and three national scientific engineering research councils, participated in the completion. The two sides invested 6.5 million Canadian dollars in three years. Cameco and COGEMA were invited as co-chairs of the planning steering committee, and members of Alberta Geological Survey, Canadian Geological Survey and Saskatchewan Department of Energy and Minerals served as project consultants. At the same time, it absorbs a large number of students from Alberta, Laurence, Regina and the University of Saskatchewan, and provides them with internship opportunities.
This project is mainly to conduct a new round of multi-agency and multi-disciplinary research on athabasca Basin and its world-class uranium deposits. Give full play to the advantages of provincial and federal geological survey institutions in uranium exploration, meet the needs of the industry for new exploration technology, and conduct more in-depth exploration in athabasca Basin; Its purpose is to enrich the four-dimensional geoscience knowledge base of athabasca Basin in Paleoproterozoic (65.438+0.7 billion years), develop new exploration methods for deep uranium deposits located on or near the unconformity surface at the bottom of basement gneiss, and make this uranium deposit in its heyday develop continuously and healthily. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct a comprehensive multi-parameter geophysical-geological survey of the world's largest extremely rich uranium deposit located in the Mackenzie River Basin, and to conduct well geophysics, organic geochemistry, stratigraphy, basement structure, aviation and ground geophysics, clay mineralogy and Quaternary studies in the entire Saskatchewan Basin.
This project consists of 1 1 subprojects:
1) high-resolution seismic reflection wave measurement;
2) Geophysical exploration in the well;
3) Research on asphalt, hydrocarbon, fluid and diagenesis;
4) regional and detailed stratigraphic study;
5) Study on regional and detailed basement structure;
6) gamma ray geophysical exploration;
7) Study on clay minerals;
8) Coordination of the above sub-projects;
9) magnetotelluric survey;
10) high-resolution gravity measurement;
1 1) Geochronology.