Commitments and Contingencies

9 Months Ended

Sep. 30, 2014

Commitments and Contingencies [Text Block]

8. Commitments and Contingencies

a) Reclamation

The following table shows the changes in the reclamation liability for the periods indicated.

		Nine months ended		Nine months ended
		September 30, 2014		September 30, 2013
Reclamation and remediation liability beginning of period	$	4,613	$	5,598
Accretion expense, year to date		287		357
Ending balance	$	4,900	$	5,955

b) Rock Creek Development

The Rock Creek project is located in Sanders County, Montana, approximately five miles northeast of Noxon, Montana and sixteen air miles southeast of Troy Mine. The project comprises 99 patented lode-mining claims, 370 unpatented lode-mining claims, five tunnel site claims, 85 mill site claims and 754 acres of fee land. The patented claims lying within the Cabinet Mountain Wilderness Area convey mineral rights only; the patented claims lying outside the wilderness area convey both mineral and surface rights and title. The patented claims were legally surveyed in 1983, patented in 1989, and occupy an area of approximately 1,809 acres. We conduct our development activities at Rock Creek through RC Resources Inc., another of our second-tier operating subsidiaries. RC Resources Inc. is also the record holder of the various claims and fee lands comprising the project.

Our proposed development of Rock Creek will occur in two phases. The first phase, a two year evaluation program, will confirm and better define the economic and technical viability of the project and reconfirm geotechnical assumptions. This initial phase will include the construction of a 7,000 foot evaluation adit to collect additional technical information; underground infill drilling to establish and confirm mineral resource estimates; geotechnical design studies; bulk sampling of the mineralization for use in metallurgical testing; and, to collect and evaluate hydrologic information. We estimate the evaluation program will cost $25 million to $30 million. Once the program is completed, we will commission a feasibility study and, if it is positive, seek financing to construct a 10,000 tons per day mine and process facility. More specific information concerning our proposed development of Rock Creek is set forth in Item 2 of this report.

We cannot begin the evaluation program until we receive final permits and approvals from the various Federal and State agencies that exercise jurisdiction over the project. Rock Creek is partially located on United States Forest Service (the “Forest Service”) land within the Kootenai National Forest and under the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness Area, and federal and state approval is required before development can commence. In 2001, the Forest Service issued a Final Environmental Impact Statement (“Final EIS”) under the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”). In 2003, the Forest Service and the Montana Department of Environmental Quality (the “DEQ”) issued a joint administrative decision approving our proposed plan of operations at Rock Creek (the “Record of Decision”). The Record of Decision was based primarily on the findings in the Final EIS and a companion biological opinion (the “Biological Opinion”) issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (“USFWS”) in 2003, pursuant to the requirements of the Endangered Species Act (“ESA”). The project was challenged by several regional and national environmental advocacy groups, culminating in a May 2010 Montana Federal District Court decision that upheld the Biological Opinion but remanded the Record of Decision to the Forest Service to address several NEPA procedural deficiencies. The Federal District Court decision upholding the Biological Opinion was affirmed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in November 2012. The Forest Service is currently working to develop a Supplemental EIS that will comply with the Federal District Court’s decision.

We are also working to satisfy other federal and state permitting requirements that are required for phase 1 development. These include reclamation bonding, designing and constructing a water treatment facility, and improving the road leading to the proposed evaluation adit site.

We currently own approximately 673 acres of fee land, located in Lincoln and Sanders Counties, that has been designated for Grizzly bear habitat mitigation lands as the Rock Creek project is developed. This land and other current and future real estate holdings that are not essential to our day to day mining operations are; or will be, held by Revett Holdings, Inc., a wholly-owned Montana subsidiary of Revett Silver. Certain of these lands may later be selected for management under the Revett Foundation according to a best-use philosophy.

Although the Company believes that it will ultimately receive all environmental and operating permits, it is possible that successful challenges to the project could delay or prevent the Company from developing Rock Creek which could result in the impairment and write-down of the carrying value related to the Rock Creek property.