As a result of this, there is great interest in how this technique could be applied to the extraction of more common metals and minerals. The processing method chosen to separate the mineral or metal resource from the ore depends on the type of minerals or the grade of the metal.
The first part of the process is to reduce the size of the pieces of mined material. It might be crushed into pebble-sized pieces or ground into a fine powder.
The mineral or metal resource is then extracted by one of the following processes, or by a combination of them:. After extraction, the metal or mineral product in solid, slurry or dissolved form may require further processing to increase its purity.
The waste material is sent to long-term storage. Coarse waste is moved to a residue pad and tailings fine waste is pumped to the tailings storage facility. For more about the criticality of tailings management, refer here insert link to tailings page. The state solid, liquid or dissolved or the metal or mineral determines how it is purified. Some products, like iron ore, only need to be sized and shaped. To produce London Metal Exchange LME grade copper cathodes the copper must first be changed from a dissolved to a sold state by solvent extraction or activated carbon adsorption.
This is then followed by electrowinning and electrorefining. Metals in a liquid slurry form are filtered and dried before being smelted or roasted. Smelting is a high-temperature process that extracts the molten metal from the slag unwanted molten waste.
Once found, they do some geological work on them to expand the knowledge about the mineral prospect. If the prospect looks favourable enough to actually create a mine, they will usually try to sell it to a larger mining company for further work. Larger mining companies will buy mineral prospects from smaller companies, or prospect from in-house geological experts and try to raise capital investment money to actually set up a mine.
This can cost billions of dollars just to set up a mine. Once they start mining, the ore is concentrated, and refined into metals like copper, zinc, or gold and sold on the open market. How do mining companies make money? Don Mac. Jun 6, If the trend is confirmed, attention will need to be given to finding sustainable solutions for affected mines and their workers. Key resources Standards C Safety and Health in Mines Convention, R Safety and Health in Mines Recommendation, Codes of practice Code of practice on safety and health in underground coalmines Code of practice on safety and health in opencast mines Handbook Safety and health in small-scale surface mines: A handbook Other ILO on-line resources Resource guide on the mining sector Occupational safety and health in the mining coal and other mining sector Useful links Safety Data: Benchmarking progress of ICMM company members in Publications Women in mining: Towards gender equality 27 September State of the Artisanal and Small Scale Mining Sector 05 May Challenges and opportunities for productive employment and decent work in the natural stone mining industry supply chain in Rajasthan 21 April
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