I am a longtime holder of this stock ( 10 years) and don't post very often but had the opportunity to attend PDAC on Monday primarily to get an update as to what is happening with Noront - I attended the meeting and was also able to speak with Mr Coutts and a couple of support staff in the Noront Booth so here is what I learned

Meeting:

Most of the stuff we already know - Coutts mentioned the road cost at $1.5MM / km for a 280 km - infil to respective First Nations communities is xtra 

They are going to do some more drilling this summer .. looking for more nickel / copper  deposits

There are 4 locations vying for ferrochrome smelter, Thunderbay, Sault Ste Marie, Timmins and Sudbury ...decision for location to be made this summer ...they are targeting the US market for ferrochrome .. two main suppliers I believe its Khazakstan and South Africa - we can't touch Khazakstan because they have significantly lower costs of production but hope to displace South Africa because their production costs are higher 

Note that Eagles nest to be mined 1st -  after year 3 looking to mine some chromite - reason for this has to do with the way the mine is to be constructed , tailings , underground quarry etc. all of which is way out of my depth

He went on to talk about the strenght of his management team (they have the know how to construct a mine) and the fact  that they want this to become another Sudbury Basin   

He also talked about training and hiring 1st nations members to work with their crews and to show the First Nation communities that he is serious about partnering with them to develop the resource   

Lastly, he qualified all of the aformentioned information by saying that all of this depends on the road being built into the mining project   

So I had the opportunity to speak with Mr Coiutts in the booth as well - this guy has lots of energy and I believe he is doing all he can to push this thing forward - however I could tell he was frustrated with the process .. he indicated that they had developed real good relations with the two First Nations communities closest to the Ring but there are seven others included in the Mattawa group and it doesn't sound like they all shared the same vision ..its very political with lots of moving parts - 

For me this project is a no brainer and should have been done long before now but here we are still waiting for a road to be built ...