Note 3 - Properties, Plants, Equipment and Mineral Interests, and Lease Commitments

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2017

Notes to Financial Statements

Property, Plant and Equipment Disclosure [Text Block]

Note

3:

Properties, Plants, Equipment and Mineral Interests, and Lease Commitments

Properties, Plants, Equipment and Mineral Interests

Our major components of properties, plants, equipment, and mineral interests are (in thousands):

	December 31,
	2017		2016
Mining properties, including asset retirement obligations	$	443,182	$	403,935
Development costs		390,094		347,356
Plants and equipment		847,462		814,091
Land		26,949		26,229
Mineral interests		919,082		952,382
Construction in progress		347,323		330,785
		2,974,092		2,874,778
Less accumulated depreciation, depletion and amortization		954,071		842,093
Net carrying value	$	2,020,021	$	2,032,685

During

2017,

we incurred total capital expenditures of approximately

$98.0

million. This excludes non-cash items for additions acquired under capital leases and adjustments for asset retirement obligations. The expenditures included

$4.5

million at the Lucky Friday unit,

$34.2

million at the Greens Creek unit,

$47.1

million at the Casa Berardi unit, and

$11.2

million at the San Sebastian unit.

Properties, plants, equipment, and mineral interests includes the portion of interest costs incurred on our debt capitalized as a part of the cost of constructing certain qualifying assets. For the years ended

December

 

31,

2017

and

2016,

capitalized interest totaled

$0.9

million and

$16.2

million, respectively. The capitalized interest was primarily related to the

#4

Shaft project at Lucky Friday, which was completed in

January 2017.

Capital Leases

We periodically enter into lease agreements, primarily for equipment at our Greens Creek, Lucky Friday and Casa Berardi units, which we have determined to be capital leases.

  As of

December 

31,

2017

and

2016,

we have recorded

$48.6

million and

$42.2

million, respectively, for the gross amount of assets acquired under the capital leases and

$33.1

 million and

$26.0

million, respectively, in accumulated depreciation on those assets, classified as plants and equipment in

Properties, plants, equipment and mineral interests

.  See

Note

6

for information on future obligations related to our capital leases.

Operating Leases

We enter into operating leases during the normal course of business. During the years ended

December 

31,

2017

,

2016

and

2015,

we incurred expenses of

$4.8

million,

$4.8

million and

$3.8

million, respectively, for these leases. At

December 

31,

2017,

future obligations under our non-cancelable operating leases were as follows (in thousands):

Year ending December 31,
2018	$	4,812
2019		2,864
2020		2,882
2021		2,881
2022		2,547
Thereafter		—
Total	$	15,986