The Use Of Minerals

The use of minerals

Useful minerals
For thousands of years people have used minerals as an important resource. In the past, minerals were, above all, a source of metal. Minerals were used to obtain raw materials like iron. In other cases, people searched for precious metals such as gold and silver, which are normally found in their natural condition.
There are still thousands of gold and silvermines, and mines for other precious stones such as diamonds. But most beds which are exploited yield minerals which are used as raw materials for other valuable products. The earth continues to have a large number of resources which are of great economic interest, although it is sometimes very difficult to extract the minerals.
Beds and mines
Beds are merely an accumulation of minerals. There aremany throughout the world, but only some of them can be exploited, because many of them contain minerals which are not very valuable or not very useful for industry. Others cannot be exploited because it is so difficult to gain access to them that, although the mineral is valuable, the extraction process makes them economically unviable.
If the bed is considered to be profitable, its exploitationis carried out by a mine. Mines today are complicated installations and require specialized machinery.
There are two kinds of mines: open-cast mines and underground mines. The choice will depend on the location of the bed which is to be exploited.
Obtaining minerals
Some metals can be found in a pure state in nature, and this is called their native state. The clearest example of this is gold; itis possible (although very rare) to find pure gold encrusted in certain rocks.
However, most minerals which are used in industry are obtained through the complex treatment of different minerals. For example, iron, aluminium and mercury are metals which are obtained from a large variety of minerals.
Minerals which are the source of metals are known as ores. Bauxite is the ore from aluminium.Siderite is the ore which we get iron. Neither of these minerals contains the metal in its pure state. The atoms of the metal are mixed with other elements forming a chemical compound which makes up the ore.
These minerals are subjected to different treatments. In the case of iron, the ore is mixed with a type of carbon suitable for casting. This mixture is then heated to a very high temperature in afoundry. The resulting product, cast iron, is the base material for obtaining industrial varieties of iron and steel.

Making use of non-metallic minerals
Mining operations are not only dedicated to obtaining metals, but also to obtaining other non-metallic minerals, example of these minerals are fluorite, salts of various kinds and phosphates. These minerals are used in various different sectors ofindustry.
Another non-metallic mineral which is economically significant is gypsum. To use gypsum, it is necessary to subject it to a calcinations process which eliminates up to 75% of water it contains. (The molecules of water join the gypsum during crystallization, as it does not have water in its liquid state). The product obtained in this way is used in building, often mixed with sand.
Inthe following unit, we will see that the building industry uses a large number of rocks and minerals, which makes obtaining these articles and important economic activity.

The problem of supply and demand
Minerals beds are difficult to find and their exploitation is costly. Furthermore, there is not an endless supply. Therefore, it is possible to forecast that if the demand for certain a mineral isvery high, the reserves of these resources may be used up in a reasonable short period.
In the table below, you can see the relationship between the supply (the available reserves) and the demand for certain materials obtained from minerals. If the demand is double the supply this means that, annually, the amount consumed by industry is twice the amount obtained from nature. This gives rise to...