Week 9: Alternative Energy, Beyond Fossil Fuels, Mineral Resources

Question 1

What is “Deep Decarbonization”?

Answer 1

A strategy to reduce the carbon emissions which involves:

• Energy efficiency
• Decarbonization of electricity supply
• Switching end use fuel to electric sources

Question 2

What is “electrification” and what are its benefits?

Answer 2

The changing of the source of power from direct fossil fuel burning to electricity.

Creates options for power generation in the future.

There is a huge opp. to reduce non-renewable sources in the transportation sector: need vehicles to stop burning fossil fuels AND relying heavily on them!

Question 3

What was the name of the first ever aircraft to fly around the world with no fuel?

Answer 3

Solar Impulse

Question 4

What is an alternative to fossil fuel for cars?

Answer 4

Hydrogen fuel cells (renewable energy sources used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen).

This requires platinum, Pt, which requires a lot of E to extract.

Question 5

What is the difference between “alternative” and “renewable” energy sources?

Answer 5

Alternative: produced (and reproduced) by the Sun or Earth within a time frame that is useful to people.

Renewable: generally inexhaustible and often associated with minimal environmental degredation.

Question 6

Why is geothermal heat extraction NON-renewable?

Answer 6

If one draws the heat from the Earth too quickly, one can lose the capacity of the geothermal system.

Question 7

List three examples of renewable energy.

Answer 7

• Hydropower
• Solar
• Wind
• Tidal
• Hydrogen
• Biomass or waste
• Biofuels

Question 8

What are some of the concerns associated with wind power?

Answer 8

• Kills birds (?)
• Cost of generation due to large capital outlay
• Local climate change (?)
• Land for roads and windmill pads
• Degradation of scenic resources?
• Light and sound pollution
• Relies on surrounding weather, so how can we store energy when wind is not blowing?

Question 9

What is a possible resource for biofuel, and what is its major advantage?

Answer 9

Create biofuel from switch grass; actually produces net negative emissions!

Question 10

In 2018, nuclear energy consisted of ___% of the world’s electricity generation, while coal made up ___%.

Answer 10

10%, 38%

Question 11

___% of Ontario’s electricity generation is nuclear.

Answer 11

59.0%

Question 12

There are around ___ nuclear power reactors worldwide.

Answer 12

440

Question 13

What are some concerns regarding nuclear power?

Answer 13

• Nuclear facilities are insanely expensive
• Public perception stifles nuclear power as an energy alternative
• Haven’t figured out a concrete way to get rid of nuclear waste
• Nuclear war and distaster

Question 14

What are some sources of nuclear fuel?

Answer 14

Uranium-235 (fissile, 0.7% of natural uranium, half-life of 700 million years).

Plutonium-239 (forms from decay of U-238, highly fissile, half-life of 24,200 years)

Question 15

Who is currently the world supplier for uranium-235?

Answer 15

Kazakhstan

Question 16

Where is the world’s largest high-grade uranium mine?

Answer 16

MacArthur River, Saskatchewan.

Produced 7654 tonnes of uranium in 2010.

Question 17

What are some of the factors associated with the perception the public has of nuclear energy?

Answer 17

• Nuclear disaster
• Clean energy
• War
• Waste

Question 18

Nuclear energy consists of ___% of the fatalities due to energy production.

Answer 18

0.001%

Question 19

How is nuclear waste typically contained?

Answer 19

1. Nuclear waste is sealed in a cladding tube.
2. Cladding tube is contained in a copper canister with a cast iron insert.
3. The canister is placed in a crystalline bedrock body.
4. The canisters and tubes are then stored ~500m underground (they can also be stored in pools)

Question 20

Hydroelectric power is a function of _______ and _______.

Answer 20

Hydroelectric power is a function of HEIGHT and VOLUME.

Question 21

What are some of the consequences of hydro-electric power?

Answer 21

• Reservoir sedimentation/pollution (N in failing water)
• Loss of land and wildlife to reservoir, changes to river ecology and downstream hydrology
• Damage and flooding of indigenous lands
• Loss of downstream aquifers and riverbank erosion
• Loss of livelihood from fisheries

Question 22

What are some tools and technology behind mineral exploration?

Answer 22

• Research
• Geophysics
• Field mapping
• Exploration drilling
• Geochemical sampling
• Structural modelling
• 3D orebody estimation
• Confirmation drilling

Question 23

What is “geochemistry”?

Answer 23

The search for indicator minerals in soil and rock using elemental isotopes to examine history in search for orebodies.

Question 24

Describe a “mineral resource” vs. an “ore reserve”

Answer 24

Mineral resource: elements/compounds/minerals/rocks concentrated in a form that can be extracted

Ore reserve: a confirmed portion of resource that can be extracted for profit.

Question 25

How may we confirm a mineral resource as an ore reserve?

Answer 25

Confirmation drilling! We must be absolutely sure there is a mineral deposit beneath the site we want to mine, as the more we drill for confirmation, the more expensive it becomes.

Question 26

What are some of the characteristics of minerals off which their economic factors are based?

Answer 26

• Size and grade of the deposit
• Mineralogy (mining and processing feasibility)
• Metal price
• Corporate strategy

Question 27

What drives mineral concentration in the crust?

Answer 27

Tectonics

Elements are concentrated in mantle through cooling when ocean crust forms; further distilled in new magma as crust and sediments are remelted in chemical stages; various volcanic reactions near surface concentrate again through condensation/precipitation.

Question 28

What is an example of a volcanic deposit?

Answer 28

Kimberlite: an incredibly catastrophic geological phenomena capable of surfacing diamonds from the depths of the Earth’s crust.

Question 29

Describe ore transport and deposition.

Answer 29

A process by which ore has been eroded from one primary source to be further concentrated and redeposited elsewhere (ex. when ore containing gold travels downstream, the ore sinks to the bottom because it weighs heavier and has a hire S.G.)

Question 30

What is an “ore”?

Answer 30

Naturally-occurring mineral aggregate of economic interest.

Question 31

What is a “mineral deposit”?

Answer 31

An abnormal concentration of minerals in the Earth’s crust.

Question 32

Describe the process of magma cooling and gravitational settling.

Answer 32

Heavy minerals crystallize early and concentrate on the bottom of the magma chamber (heavier and have a higher S.G.)

Question 33

How do porphyry orebodies form?

Answer 33

Fluids circulate through multiple magmatic intrusions, dissolving and precipitating Copper. Really complicated network of mineral veins caused by catastrophic mangling of the ore mass, which creates monstrous ore bodies called porphyry bodies.

Question 34

What is Volcanogenic Massive Sulphide (VMS)

Answer 34

Hydrothermal groundwater dissolves metals in the presence of salt.

Black smokers are seawater gushes from the seafloor near spreading centres and precipitates sulphide deposits.

Question 35

What is an astrobleme? Give an example.

Answer 35

A massive asteroid capable of shattering the Earth’s crust (the one in Mexico, and the one in Sudbury).

The one in Sudbury may be a source of nickel and, therefore, the source of the city’s mining economy. Rupture of crust created mineralized volcanic surges from below and the melting of Cu-Ni steroid.

Question 36

List two examples of mining methods.

Answer 36

1. Room and Pillar: mechanized room and pillar methods used for extraction (will have to sacrifice some of the ore to act as pillars though).
2. Vertical Crater Retreat (VCR) mining: process is customized to fit the geometry of the environment. There are drill overcuts in the rock to hold it together for support, and then the rock is blasted that way.
3. Cut and Fill: cut the floor as you mine upwards.
4. Sub-level mining
5. Vein mining (high-risk, involves mining tunnels on an angle with a hanging wall and a foot wall.
6. Sublevel Caving: you have those above-ground steps 15m high, and then you have underground tunnels to mine.
7. Block Caving: dig tunnels, blow up sections of rock, have the rock travel down the tunnels to be collected.