Canada Nickel Co. CEO Mark Selby, who has been involved in nickel since the early 2000s when he joined Inco Ltd., said Canada does have an edge when it comes to the metal. Photo by ANDREW AUTIO/Postmedia

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“Private capital is just getting comfortable again … in mining,” said Mark Selby, chief executive of Canada Nickel Co. “You’re not going to see three deals announced next week.”

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Selby said that the message from critical-mineral executives at the summit will be that the Canadian government is serious about issuing permits and clearing paths for project development.

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He is hopeful the summit, which has attracted scores of officials from pension and sovereign wealth funds around the world, will start the process of reacquainting institutional investors with the mining space after years of permitting delays and community opposition to projects led them to limit their mining investments to companies that already produce cash flow or shift altogether to oil and gas.

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“In three months and six months … (I think) you’re going to start to see more of these funds go: ‘Okay, yeah, you know what, we do need to think about allocating a little more capital (to earlier stage mining),” Selby said.

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“Hopefully the conversations that are going to happen in the sessions with government and these offshore investors will reinforce that message of we really do want your capital to come into Canada to help build these projects out… It’s the first step.”

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Even a small change in attitude toward mining could make a big difference.

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“These funds are so large that even a one or two percentage point shift in in asset allocation toward natural resources would feel like a tidal wave of capital coming at this sector,” Selby said.

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Canada Nickel Co.’s proposal to build a mine in the world’s second-largest nickel reserve near Timmins, Ont., ticks a lot of boxes for the federal government and could resonate with global investors that have sustainability built into their mandates and who gravitate toward investments that can be held over long time horizons.

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Large funds, including Singapore’s Temasek, whose chief executive, Dillan Pillay, met with Prime Minister Mark Carney on Monday, consider environmental, social and governance factors when they invest.

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By 2029, the Crawford Nickel Project mine, which cleared a federal impact assessment in July, will produce high-quality, low-carbon nickel needed for electric car batteries and “green” steel and alloys, which are used in infrastructure, transportation and aerospace. The mine is expected to operate for more than 40 years and use proprietary carbon mineralization technology to permanently store carbon dioxide. It has the backing of the Taykwa Tagamou Nation, which is an investor in the mine.