Knowledge Base

Located in the Mount Isa inlier of Queensland, Australia, the Mt Isa deposits represent the largest accumulations of lead, zinc and silver in the world. The first deposits were discovered ...

What is Block Caving? Block (gravity) caving is a bulk underground mining method, which allows large low-grade deposits to be mined underground. This method involves undermining the orebody to make ...

Although cobalt (Co) is well known for the blue dyes that bear its name, metallic cobalt is a lustrous silver-grey. Metallic cobalt is ferromagnetic (can be magnetized) and has a very high ...

Introduction Molybdenum (Mo, Atomic number 42) is a silvery grey metal, notable for its extremely high melting point (2623°C). It has many uses in the aerospace, military and petroleum industries, ...

Introduction The gold fields of the Witwatersrand Basin in South Africa are, by a landslide, the largest single gold producing district in the world. It has produced some 2 billion ounces ...

Limestone is one of the most important and versatile industrial mineral commodities. It is a crucial mineral in the making of Portland cement and mortar, but is also used in ...

In our first two articles we discussed the history and geology of the Grasberg Mine and it is now time to come back to what makes Grasberg so important: The Mine. The massive size ...

Lithium (Li) is a metallic element that is most often found in granitic “pegmatites” (intrusive igneous rocks), brines (salty solutions), seawater and clays. In it’s pure form it is soft light silver ...

In Grasberg Part 1 we discussed the social and cultural aspects of the Grasberg deposit and outlined it’s long and fascinating history. In this article we’ll dig into the geology of this ...

Silica Silica (SiO2) occurs naturally as crystalline quartz, some less important forms of quartz, and opal. Quartz can be found in both hard, large crystal forms as well as being ...