Quiz 2 Flashcards
Significance of tellurium minerals
Solar cells
Significance of cobalt
Used in speakers, phones, electric motors, rechargeable batteries, stainless steel. Most of it is mined in Africa. US is largest consumer but doesn’t produce.
Ore
Material that occurs naturally and contains a mineral(s) that can be extracted for profit
Ore grade
The concentration of the desired metal/element within the ore. Often given in percentages (i.e. 2% has 2 pounds of material in 100 pounds of ore)
Beneficiation
Separates desired mineral from the rest of the rocks and minerals in the ore
Leaching
The use of chemicals to dissolve desired metals and transport them in a solution to the collection area
Refining
The final process in purifying an ore to the concentration after beneficiation
Tailings
Waste material created by beneficiation
The process of ore extraction includes these steps:
Exploring, extraction, beneficiation/smelting/refining (concentrating it)
Some methods geologists use for finding suitable mining locations (part of exploration)
Maps, results at similar geological environments, and visit to potential site for field studies (mapping, sampling, and/or chemical analysis)
Surface mining vs underground mining
Surface mines are typically larger and use blasting procedures.
Underground mines are smaller operations with less land disturbance and waste rock (and the waste is often moved to the surface or used to fill in mine areas no longer in use)
The presence of what type of minerals leads to pollution/contamination?
Sulfides
Beneficiation
The process through which the desired minerals are concentrated
Smelting
Separates the metal from the material through heating in the presence of a material known as flux. Desired mineral settles to bottom of melt, undesireables (slag) rise to top
Some new standards for mine closure, in order to reduce contamination
Slope stabilization and water/soil treatment
Hydration shell
Cations that “hydrolize” in water change pH – small ions with high charge tend to hold onto some water molecules
Lithium
Mined from intrusive igneous rock, often mined from brine, component in batteries, most brine-derived lithium is located in one spot of the Andes Mountains of South America
Brine mining
Well is drilled and brine is pumped to the surface; brine will evaporate, minerals don’t need to be separated, and rocks don’t need to be broken and moved
Instrusive/plutonic
Rocks crystallized from slowly cooling magma intruded within the Earth’s crust. These rocks are course-grained; deep-seated, major intrustions
Extrusive/volcanic
Rocks crystallized from rapidly-cooling magma, extruded on the surface of Earth as lava or erupted as pyroclastic material. These rocks are fine-grained, from extrusive lava flows
Phaneritic
Course-grained, intrusive rocks
Aphanitic
Fine-grained, extrusive rocks
Vesicular
Contains vesicles (gas bubbles escaping lava)
Porphyritic
Large crystals in fine-grained matrix. This mixture of course and fine comes from rocks cooling at different temperatures
Glassy minerals tell us…
That minerals underwent rapid cooling (pumice and obsidian)
Pyroclastic
(Fragmental); consolidation of individual rock fragments, ejected during volcanic eruption
Two components of a porphyritic texture, and their definitions
Groundmass: fine-grain material (forms last)
Phenocryst: chunky texture/rock chunks
Pumice vs tuff
Tuff: volcanic ash that’s been cemented together, has a higher density
Pumice: highly vesicular textured volcanic glass
Lithic tuff
Tuff with predominantly rock fragments
Vitric tuff
Tuff with predominantly pumice and glass fragments
Crystal tuff
Tuff with predominantly crystal fragments
QOP triangle components and what rock type it concerns
Quartz
Orthoclase
Plagioclase
Mainly concern felsic, intrusive rocks
3 factors affecting melting (and how)
Pressure: increased pressure raises melting points (atoms are tighter and require increased energy to get them to vibrate)
Water content: increased water content lowers melting points. Water weakens the minerals’ bonds
Composition: felsic minerals melt at lower temperatures than mafic materials
Origin of magmas
Mafic: melting of upper mantle (ex: at divergent spreading centers)
Intermediate: melting of sedimentary rocks and mafic lithosphere (ex: in subduction zones)
Felsic: melting of continental crust rocks
Magma differentiation
Process by which rocks of various compositions can arise from uniform parent magma (mafic melts first, cools last, vice versa for felsic)
Fractional crystallization
The process by which crystals forming in a cooling magma are segregated from the remaining liquid; the chemical composition of the magma slowly changes
In a simple scenario, crystal settles to the floor or adheres to the walls of the magma chamber
The reason magma becomes differentiated is because of fractional crystallization
Bowen’s Reaction series
As our structure changes, it affects which minerals crystallize first (simplest structures crystallize first)
Factors that affect viscosity
Magma composition (more silica = more viscous), temperature (lower temp = more viscous), amount of dissolved gases (increased amount decreases viscosity)
3 major types of lavas
Basaltic, rhyolitic, and andesitic
Mafic vs felsic magma
Mafic: low viscosity (flows), low explosiveness, divergent plate tectonic setting
Felsic: high viscosity (flows less), highly explosive, convergent plate tectonic setting
Mafic, plutonic rock
Gabbro
Mafic, volcanic rock
Basalt
Felsic, plutonic rock
Granite
Felsic, volcanic rock
Rhyolite
Gross domestic product
Indicator of a country’s economic performance and its level of development.
Natural resource consumption rate
Domestic extraction of a material plus its imports minus its exports of the same materials
Energy density
How much energy is in a given mass. Used for batteries
What temperature do rocks start to melt at
700 C
Decompression melting
Pressure-induced melting
Flux melting
Water content-induced melting
Partial melting causes magma to…
Get more felsic, become less dense, and rise
