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The article presents facts about graphite ideal for industrial applications. Among the characteristics of graphite are its metallic luster, softness, perfect basal cleavage and electrical conductivity. Batteries, brake linings and powdered metals are some of the products that make use of graphite. It attributes the potential applications for graphite in high-technology fields to innovations in thermal technology and acid-leaching techniques.
Natural resources have always been a strength for Indiana. Once largely covered by forest, the State now includes a mix of forest, farmland, wetlands, and small lakes. In fact, farms and forested areas make up more than 80 percent of the land. The Ohio River forms the southern border, and the south shore of Lake Michigan contrasts with urban development in the northwestern corner. Indiana Dunes National and State Parks reside just east of the Chicago metropolitan area. Agriculture adds more than $30 billion to the economy in Indiana, which placed eighth in the country for agricultural exports at $4.6 billion in 2017. Indiana ranks in the top five States nationally for the production of corn and soybeans. The “Hoosier State” also grows sizable crops of popcorn, spearmint, peppermint, pumpkins, tomatoes, and watermelon. Additionally, hogs, cattle, dairy, and poultry contribute to the agricultural economy. Other industries important to Indiana include manufacturing, medicine, energy, and mining. Mineral sources vary from coal, building stone, and gypsum to sand, gravel, and shale. Landsat can help monitor the condition of natural resources and the effects of extreme weather events. Here are several ways Landsat has benefited Indiana.
Construction aggregates, primarily stone, sand and gravel, are recovered from widespread naturally occurring mineral deposits and processed for use primarily in the construction industry. They are mined, crushed, sorted by size and sold loose or combined with portland cement or asphaltic cement to make concrete products to build roads, houses, buildings, and other structures. Much smaller quantities are used in agriculture, cement manufacture, chemical and metallurgical processes, glass production and many other products.
This map displays over 1,500 mineral facilities in Africa and the Middle East. The mineral facilities include mines, plants, mills, or refineries of aluminum, cement, coal, copper, diamond, gold, iron and steel, nickel, platinum-group metals, salt, and silver, among others. The data used in this poster were compiled from multiple sources, including the 2004 USGS Minerals Yearbook (Africa and Middle East volume), Minerals Statistics and Information from the USGS Web site (http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/), and data collected by USGS minerals information country specialists. Data reflect the most recent published table of industry structure for each country. Other sources include statistical publications of individual countries, annual reports and press releases of operating companies, and trade journals. Due to the sensitivity of some energy commodity data, the quality of these data should be evaluated on a country-by-country basis. Additional information and explanation is available from the country specialists. See Table 1 for general information about each mineral facility site including country, location and facility name, facility type, latitude, longitude, mineral commodity, mining method, main operating company, status, capacity, and units.
While previous resource conflicts have often been linked to fuel minerals such as oil, future resource conflict may revolve around nonfuel minerals that enable strategic emerging technologies. During a 2010 diplomatic dispute, China reportedly blocked exports of rare earth elements to Japan, thereby leveraging China’s near-monopoly to threaten Japanese manufacturers of advanced technologies including batteries and permanent magnets. Although this caused significant concern for manufacturers outside China, China’s control over other critical minerals has yet to be studied comprehensively. Besides rare earth elements, perhaps no mineral has received more attention for its supply risks than cobalt. Here Chinese control is estimated for each cobalt material at each stage of the cobalt supply chain from 2000 through 2022. The results show that from mining, to refining, consumption, recycling, stocks, and trade, China dominates the cobalt materials that feed lithium-ion battery cathode production. Specifically, the results show that in 2022 Chinese firms had control over 62% of cobalt mine materials primarily used for cobalt chemical refining, 95% control of refined commercial-grade cobalt chemicals, 92% control of battery-grade tricobalt tetroxide, 85% control of battery-grade cobalt sulfate, and 91% control of nickel–cobalt-manganese cathode precursor materials. China’s monopoly over cobalt battery materials may imply a serious supply risk to non-Chinese battery producing and consuming industries—especially given rising geopolitical tensions and the reemergence of critical mineral export restrictions including gallium for semiconductors, germanium for solar panels, graphite for lithium-ion batteries, and (again) rare earth elements.
The global economy is unprepared to meet the exploding demand for critical minerals. These materials, many of which were of little economic interest until recently, are required to fuel a proliferation of technologies and industries that have become vital for social and economic well-being the world over. But supplies of critical minerals are at risk because of their natural scarcity and because of geopolitical issues and trade policies that complicate their distribution, among other factors.
The production of crushed stone suitable for highway and general construction is a major industry in Georgia. The state ranks eighth in the nation in overall crushed stone production, and first in crushed granite production. Crushed stone production in Georgia in 1979 was 40,902,000 short tons worth $154,021,000 (D.H. White, Jr., US Bureau of Mines, personal commun., Aug. 1980). More than 3,000 people were employed by the crushed stone industry in Georgia during that year. Presently, the only active quarry in Heard County is located in an amphibolite. Amphibolite is not a conventional aggregate. It has a high specific gravity, a tendency to make elongate fragments, and varies considerably in abrasion tests. Because the nearest approved aggregate quarry is more than 25 miles from Franklin, the county seat, the purpose of this brief report is to describe a body of granite gneiss that may provide suitable aggregate for the crushed stone industry, potential quarry operators and various agencies in Heard County. This report is part of a project to study the geology and mineral resources of the Piedmont south of the Brevard Zone, and is not intended to supplant detailed site investigations by industry or consultants. The report is a joint effort between the Georgia Geologic Survey and the Office of Materials and Research of the Georgia Department of Transportation.
Galveston County, on the Texas gulf coast, is underlain by alternating beds of sand and clay. These sand and clay strata crop out in belts that roughly parallel the coastline and dip gently southeastward at an angle gre? +,er than the slope of the land, thereby creating artesian aquifers. The formations that yield potable water to wells are the Lissie formation, the "Alta Loma" sand and other sands of the Beaumont clay, and beach and dune sands of Recent aie. Most of the potable water is obtained on the mainland of Galveston County. The water from most wells on Galveston Island is highly mineralized. Before 1948, water for all public use and nearly all industrial use was derived from wells. Most ground water now used in the county is pumped from areas around Alta Loma and Texas City. The average daily pumpage in these areas increased from 6 million gallons in 1938 to 17.8 million gallons in 1940 and reached a peak of about 34 million gallons in 1945. Between 1945 and 1948 the rate of pumpage was nearly constant, but in 1948 surface water was diverted from the Brazos River to supply some of the Texas City industries and, as a result, the use of ground water was reduced about 30 percent. Water levels declined in county wells as the pumpage increased during the years prior to 1948. Since water from the Brazos River has been utilized the levels have risen in many wells and tended to become constant in others. Subsidence of the land in a large part of the county, particularly in the Texas City area, is attributed to the excessive withdrawal of ground water. Salt-water encroachment has been a problem in the county for many years. Salt water was present in the lower part of the "Alta Loma" sand in the Alta Loma and Texas City areas and throughout that sand on Galveston Island when the first wells were drilled. Encroachment from either below or downdip took place with the lowering of artesian pressure in the aquifer in the vicinity of Alta Loma and Texas City. Pumping tests reveal that the average coefficient of transmissibility of the "Alta Loma" sand is 102,000 at Alta Loma and 153,000 at Texas City. The coefficients- of transmissibility of sands in the upper part of the Beaumont clay around Texas City average 27,300. Surface water from the Brazos River, used for the irrigation of rice since 1942, was made available in 1948 to industries in Texas City as a substitute for ground water. The water from the Brazos River is variable in quality, but probably can be utilized on a somewhat larger scale than at present. Much additional ground water could be obtained from both the "Alta Loma" sand and the upper part of the Beaumont clay, especially in the northern and western parts of the county. Before large developments of supplies are planned, however, these areas should be explored by test drilling. The problems of well spacing and pumping rates should be thoroughly studied in order to determine the maximum development permitted by the ground-water supply. Current observations should be continued with special emphasis on the progress of salt-water encroachment.
Since domestic sulfur production peaked at nearly 11 million metric tons in 1974, the sulfur industry has undergone dramatic change. In 1974, mined sulfur produced using the Frasch hot water method provided 8 million tons of sulfur, representing 75 percent of total elemental sulfur production. (In the Frasch process, hot water is injected directly into the sulfur-containing mineral strata, melting the crystalline sulfur, which then lifts to the surface with air.) The remaining 25 percent was produced as byproduct sulfur.
The search for uranium in the United States is one of the most intensive ever made for any metal during our history. The number of prospectors and miners involved is difficult to estimate but some measure of the size of the effort is indicated by the fact that about 500 geologists are employed by government and industry in the work--more than the total number of geologists engaged in the study of all other minerals together except oil. The largest part of the effort has been concentrated in the western states. No single deposit of major importance by world standards has been discovered but the search has led to the discovery of important minable deposits of carnotite and related minerals on the Colorado Plateau; of large, low grade deposits of uranium in phosphates in the northwestern states and in lignites in the Dakotas, Wyoming, Idaho and New Mexico; and of many new and some promising occurrences of uranium in carnotite-like deposits and in vein deposits. Despite the fact that a large number of the districts considered favorable for the occurrence of uranium have already been examined, the outlook for future discoveries is bright, particularly for uranium in vein and in carnotite-like deposits in the Rocky Mountain States.
This is an abbreviated text supplementing the content of three sets of slides used in a short course that has been presented by the author at several workshops. The slides should be viewed in the order of (1) Introduction and models, (2) Delineation and estimation, and (3) Combining estimates and summary. References cited in the slides are listed at the end of this text. The purpose of the three-part form of mineral resource assessments discussed in the accompanying slides is to make unbiased quantitative assessments in a format needed in decision-support systems so that consequences of alternative courses of action can be examined. The three-part form of mineral resource assessments was developed to assist policy makers evaluate the consequences of alternative courses of action with respect to land use and mineral-resource development. The audience for three-part assessments is a governmental or industrial policy maker, a manager of exploration, a planner of regional development, or similar decision-maker. Some of the tools and models presented here will be useful for selection of exploration sites, but that is a side benefit, not the goal. To provide unbiased information, we recommend the three-part form of mineral resource assessments where general locations of undiscovered deposits are delineated from a deposit type's geologic setting, frequency distributions of tonnages and grades of well-explored deposits serve as models of grades and tonnages of undiscovered deposits, and number of undiscovered deposits are estimated probabilistically by type. The internally consistent descriptive, grade and tonnage, deposit density, and economic models used in the design of the three-part form of assessments reduce the chances of biased estimates of the undiscovered resources. What and why quantitative resource assessments: The kind of assessment recommended here is founded in decision analysis in order to provide a framework for making decisions concerning mineral resources under conditions of uncertainty. What this means is that we start with the question of what kinds of questions is the decision maker trying to resolve and what forms of information would aid in resolving these questions. Some applications of mineral resource assessments: To plan and guide exploration programs, to assist in land use planning, to plan the location of infrastructure, to estimate mineral endowment, and to identify deposits that present special environmental challenges. Why not just rank prospects / areas? Need for financial analysis, need for comparison with other land uses, need for comparison with distant tracts of land, need to know how uncertain the estimates are, need for consideration of economic and environmental consequences of possible development. Our goal is to provide unbiased information useful to decision-makers.
Introduction China's dominant position as the producer of over 95 percent of the world output of rare-earth minerals and rapid increases in the consumption of rare earths owing to the emergence of new clean-energy and defense-related technologies, combined with China's decisions to restrict exports of rare earths, have resulted in heightened concerns about the future availability of rare earths. As a result, industrial countries such as Japan, the United States, and countries of the European Union face tighter supplies and higher prices for rare earths. This paper briefly reviews China's rare-earth production, consumption, and reserves and the important policies and regulations regarding the production and trade of rare earths, including recently announced export quotas. The 15 lanthanide elements-lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, promethium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, holmium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium, and lutetium (atomic numbers 57-71)-were originally known as the rare earths from their occurrence in oxides mixtures. Recently, some researchers have included two other elements-scandium and yttrium-in their discussion of rare earths. Yttrium (atomic number 39), which lies above lanthanum in transition group III of the periodic table and has a similar 3+ ion with a noble gas core, has both atomic and ionic radii similar in size to those of terbium and dysprosium and is generally found in nature with lanthanides. Scandium (atomic number 21) has a smaller ionic radius than yttrium and the lanthanides, and its chemical behavior is intermediate between that of aluminum and the lanthanides. It is found in nature with the lanthanides and yttrium. Rare earths are used widely in high-technology and clean-energy products because they impart special properties of magnetism, luminescence, and strength. Rare earths are also used in weapon systems to obtain the same properties.
Industry, commerce, and public utilities in 1954 withdrew about 1,500 mgd from surface- and groundwater sources in the New Orleans area. Most of the withdrawal was made from the Mississippi River. However, some withdrawal of surface water was made from Lake Pontchartrain. A large part of the withdrawal from both ground- and surface-water sources is available for reuse. Ground-water withdrawal amounts to about 100 mgd and is primarily for industrial and commercial uses. The average flow of the Mississippi River for the 23-year period, 1931--54, amounted to 309,000 mgd, and the approximate average flow of all the tributaries to Lake Pontchartrain is about 4,000 mgd. The flow of the Pearl River, which adjoins the tributary drainage area of Lake Pontchartrain, averages about 8,000 mgd. Total withdrawal of ground and surface waters amounts to less than 3 percent of the recorded minimum flow of the Mississippi River or less than 1 percent of the average flow. Although large quantities of water are always available in the Mississippi River the quality of the Water is not suitable for all uses. Streams from the north that drain into Lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain, and the aquifers in that area, offer one of the best sources of fresh water in the State. Industry, if located on the northern shores of Lake Maurepas or Lake Pontchartrain near the mouths of these tributaries, would be assured of an ample supply of either ground or surface water of excellent quality. All the tributaries north of Lake Pontchartrain have dry-weather flows which are dependable. The Pearl River above Bogalusa also is a good source of fresh water of excellent quality. At present it serves to dilute the tidal flow of salt water into Lake Pontchartrain through the Rigolets, the principal outlet of the lake. In the area north of Lake Pontchartrain, wells 60 to 2,000 feet deep yield fresh water. There are no known wells tapping sands below 2,000 feet. However, electrical logs of. oil-test wells show that fresh water is available to a maximum depth of 3,000 feet. In the area south of Lake Pontchartrain, there is no withdrawal of ground water for public water supplies because of the saline content of the water. Three principal water-bearing sands, the '200-foot, ' '400-foot, ' and '700-foot'sands, are tapped in the New Orleans area south of Lake Pontchartrain for industrial and commercial use. In this area all deeper sands yield salt water. In some areas the '200-foot' sand contains saline water of the sodium chloride type. Consequently, this sand is not developed extensively. Water from the 200-foot' sand is relatively fresh north of the Mississippi River and becomes increasingly saline to the south and west. The 400-foot' sand is the second most highly developed aquifer in the New Orleans industrial district. The aquifer appears to be very prolific, but its full capabilities have not yet been determined. This aquifer yields a highly mineralized sodium chloride water in some areas; however, elsewhere it is a source of large quantities of fresh water. The '700-foot' sand is the most continuous freshwater bearing sand in the area and is the principal source of fresh ground water in the New Orleans industrial district. Most of the wells tapping this aquifer yield soft water of the bicarbonate type. In the southern and western parts of the industrial district the water in the '700-foot' sand is too mineralized to be suitable for human consumption.
The United Nations have studied how the oil and gas resource classification developed jointly by the SPE, the World Petroleum Congress (WPC) and the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) could be harmonized with the United Nations Framework Classification (UNFC) for Solid Fuel and Mineral Resources (1). The United Nations has continued to build on this and other works, with support from many relevant international organizations, with the objective of updating the UNFC to apply to the extractive industries. The result is the United Nations Framework Classification for Energy and Mineral Resources (2) that this paper will present. Reserves and resources are categorized with respect to three sets of criteria: ??? Economic and commercial viability ??? Field project status and feasibility ??? The level of geologic knowledge The field project status criteria are readily recognized as the ones highlighted in the SPE/WPC/AAPG classification system of 2000. The geologic criteria absorb the rich traditions that form the primary basis for the Russian classification system, and the ones used to delimit, in part, proved reserves. Economic and commercial criteria facilitate the use of the classification in general, and reflect the commercial considerations used to delimit proved reserves in particular. The classification system will help to develop a common understanding of reserves and resources for all the extractive industries and will assist: ??? International and national resources management to secure supplies; ??? Industries' management of business processes to achieve efficiency in exploration and production; and ??? An appropriate basis for documenting the value of reserves and resources in financial statements.
Methods are described which afford a determination of each member of the alkali group and are successful in dealing with the quantities of the rare alkalies found in rocks and minerals. The procedures are relatively rapid and based chiefly on the use of chloroplatinic acid, absolute alcohol and ether, and ammonium sulfate. The percentages of all the alkalies found in a number of minerals are given.
This data set consists of records for over 900 mineral facilities in Latin America and Canada. The mineral facilities include mines, plants, smelters, or refineries of aluminum, cement, coal, copper, diamond, gold, iron and steel, nickel, platinum-group metals, salt, and silver, among others. Records include attributes such as commodity, country, location, company name, facility type and capacity if applicable, and generalized coordinates. The data were compiled from multiple sources, including the 2003 and 2004 USGS Minerals Yearbooks (Latin America and Candada volume), data to be published in the 2005 Minerals Yearbook Latin America and Canada Volume, minerals statistics and information from the USGS minerals information Web site (minerals.usgs.gov/minerals), and data collected by USGS minerals information country specialists. Data reflect the most recent published table of industry structure for each country. Other sources include statistical publications of individual countries, annual reports and press releases of operating companies,and trade journals. Due to the sensitivity of some energy commodity data, the quality of these data should be evaluated on a country-by-country basis. Additional information and explanation is available from the country specialists.
The U.S. Geological Survey does regional, national, and global assessments of resources (mineral, energy, water, biologic) to provide science in support of land management and decision making. Mineral resource assessments provide a synthesis of available information about where mineral deposits are known and suspected to be in the Earth’s crust, which commodities may be present, and estimates of amounts of resources that may be present in undiscovered deposits. Canada is an important source of copper, consistently ranking as one of the top 10 world producers during the past decade (2000–2010). The preponderance of this production has been from porphyry-copper-type deposits in the western Canadian Cordillera. A probabilistic mineral resource assessment of undiscovered resources associated with porphyry copper deposits in western Canada was completed as part of a global mineral resource assessment. The purpose of the assessment was to (1) compile a database of known deposits and significant prospects, (2) delineate permissive areas (tracts) for undiscovered porphyry copper deposits that may be present in the upper kilometer (minimally) of the Earth’s crust, and (3) provide probabilistic estimates of amounts of copper (Cu), molybdenum (Mo), gold (Au), and silver (Ag) that could be contained in undiscovered porphyry copper deposits in the tracts. The study was done by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in collaboration with geologists from the British Columbia Geological Survey, Yukon Geological Survey, and industry consultants. The database of known deposits and significant prospects includes an inventory of mineral resources in 89 known porphyry copper (and 2 related copper-bearing polymetallic vein) ore zones, representing 50 porphyry copper deposits, and lists key characteristics of 280 additional porphyry copper and related copper-bearing prospects, as indicated by currently available exploration results, which also are summarized. Resource and exploration and development activity are updated with information current through April 2010. The delineation of permissive tracts and probabilistic estimation of resources in undiscovered deposits were done using the USGS three-part mineral resource assessment approach. Permissive tracts are defined in accordance with descriptive models for porphyry copper deposits to include igneous rocks and known deposits and prospects within magmatic arcs related to convergent plate-margin boundary zones. Frequency distributions of total tonnages and average grades of thoroughly explored deposits were used as models for undiscovered deposits and include a new grade and tonnage model for calc-alkaline porphyry Cu±Mo±Au deposits in western Canada. Five permissive tracts for the occurrence of porphyry copper deposits were delineated: 2 island-arc tracts, 1 tract of transitional, mixed island-arc and continental arc affinities, and 2 continental arc tracts. In permissive tract 003pCu2001, calc-alkaline igneous rocks of Middle Triassic to Late Jurassic age in accreted island-arc terranes of the Intermontane belt are assessed for calc-alkaline porphyry Cu±Mo±Au deposits. The area of this tract is 175,250 km 2 . In 12 known deposits, the total reported tonnage of ore is 8,100 million metric tons (Mt) containing 24.6 Mt copper. An estimated 6.9 undiscovered deposits contain a calculated mean of 8.9 Mt copper and a median of 6.9 Mt copper. The spatial density for the 18.9 known plus estimated undiscovered deposits in this tract is approximately 11 deposits per 100,000 km 2 . In permissive tract 003pCu2002, alkaline igneous rocks of Middle Triassic to Late Jurassic age within the Intermontane accreted island-arc terranes are assessed for alkaline porphyry Cu-Au deposits. The area of this tract is 109,290 km 2 . In 12 known deposits the total reported tonnage of ore is 6,440 Mt, containing 20.9 Mt copper. An estimated 7 undiscovered deposits contain a calculated mean of 22 Mt copper and a median of 13 Mt copper. The spatial density for the 19 known plus estimated undiscovered deposits in this tract is approximately 17 deposits per 100,000 km 2 . In permissive tract 003pCu2003, calc-alkaline igneous rocks of Late Triassic to Early Cretaceous age within the accreted Insular terranes of mixed island-arc and continental arc affinities are assessed for calc-alkaline porphyry Cu±Mo±Au deposits. The area of this tract is 58,360 km 2 . The total tonnage of ore reported in the 2 known deposits is 1,160 Mt containing 3.17 Mt copper. An estimated 2.3 undiscovered deposits contain a calculated mean of 3 Mt copper and a median of 1.9 Mt copper. The spatial density for the 4.3 known plus estimated undiscovered deposits in this tract is approximately 7 deposits per 100,000 km 2 . In permissive tract 003pCu2004, calc-alkaline igneous rocks in continental magmatic arcs of Jurassic to Eocene age are assessed for porphyry Cu±Mo±Au deposits. The area of this tract is 639,500 km 2 . The total tonnage of ore reported for the 23 known deposits is 6,520 Mt containing 17.9 Mt copper. An estimated 9.6 undiscovered deposits contain a calculated mean of 13 Mt copper and a median of 11 Mt copper. The spatial density for the 32.6 known deposits plus the estimated undiscovered deposits in this tract is approximately 5 deposits per 100,000 km 2 . In permissive tract 003pCu2005, calc-alkaline igneous rocks in continental magmatic arcs of Oligocene to Pliocene age are assessed for porphyry Cu±Mo±Au deposits. The area of this tract is 32,840 km 2 . The total tonnage of ore reported for the 1 known deposit is 44.8 Mt containing 0.224 Mt copper. An estimated 1.4 undiscovered deposits contain a calculated mean of 1.8 Mt copper and a median of 0.72 Mt copper. The spatial density for the 2.4 known plus estimated undiscovered deposits in this permissive tract is approximately 7 deposits per 100,000 km 2 . Western Canada has been thoroughly explored for porphyry copper deposits. The total estimated copper contained in known deposits is about 66.8 Mt (based on 2010 data), as compared to a 49 Mt mean of estimated copper in undiscovered deposits and a 34 Mt median of estimated copper in undiscovered deposits. The copper contained in known porphyry copper deposits represents about 58 percent of the total of known and undiscovered porphyry copper deposits (based on mean values). About 86 percent of the increase in estimated copper resources between 1993 and 2009 resulted from the discovery of extensions to known deposits. Nevertheless, exploration for undiscovered deposits continues, especially in and around significant prospects and in parts of permissive tracts that are mostly hidden beneath younger volcanic, sedimentary, or vegetated surficial cover.
Idaho and Montana state mining statistics were obtained from historical mineral production records and compiled into a continuous record from 1905 through 2001. To facilitate comparisons, the mineral production data were normalized by converting the units of measure to metric tons for all included commodities. These standardized statistical data include production rates for principal non-fuel mineral commodities from both Idaho and Montana, as well as the production rates of similar commodities for the U.S. and the world for contrast. Data are presented here in both tabular and bar chart format. Moreover, the tables of standardized mineral production data are also provided in digital format as, commodity_production.xls. Some significant historical events pertaining to the mining industry are described as well. When taken into account with the historical production data, this combined information may to help explain both specific fluctuations and general tendencies in the overall trends in the rates of mineral resource production over time.