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Published On: Sep 16, 2005 07:13 AM
Total entries in this category:
Published On: Sep 16, 2005 07:13 AM
A visit to the Molycorp Mine
I had the pleasure of driving to scenic Mountain
Springs, California to do a little desert tortoise and endangered species
monitoring at the Molycorp rare earth mine. The mine is currently shut down
although they are processing some ore. It turns out that an unlined pond for
tailings is leaking and potentially contaminating the groundwater with salt
water and they are going to drill some monitoring
wells.
I gave a tortoise worker education class to three workers who were going to fix up the access road to one of the monitoring wells and then I made sure they didn't harm any protected species fixing up the washed out dirt road to the site. It was nice working in some higher elevation habitat. I rarely get to work near juniper trees and blackbrush is a nice change from creosote. I didn't find any tortoise sign but one of the workers has seen them in area before. Best of all, it was nice and cool up there. Vegas is already getting into the 80s so to work in the 60s with a cool breeze was a cool treat.
Actually, the cool treat was the mine tour. Since college, I have been really interested in this mine because it is the only one of its type in the United States. The geology and mineralogy of the area is very unusual. The geologist took me down into their large pit where I got to take a few samples of the carbonatite (a rare carbonate igneous rock— almost all carbonates are sedimentary). To get rid of groundwater in the pit, they are blowing a mist of water into the air evaporating the water.
The geologist took me through the rest of the mine site and we toured the (thankfully quiet) ball mill and flotation tanks. I got about a cup full of lanthanum concentrate. The lanthanides are the wacky elements that only get mentioned briefly even in college chemistry classes. They are considered rare earth elements even though they are not very rare or expensive. On the periodic table, they are the top row of the bottom separate section and include such tongue twisters as dysprosium, neodymium, gadolinium, erbium, terbium, yttrium, and ytterbium (the last four elements named after a Swedish town!).
The mine's discovery and history has an interesting story. Basically, Molycorp claimed the deposit and they spent years trying to find uses for these elements. It turns out that cerium is useful for lighter flints and europium is used in the red phosphor on color TV sets. Gadolinium has unusual magnetic properties and is injected into MRI patients. Of course, neodymium is used in "rare-earth" magnets in speakers, computer hard drives, and toys. (Here is a great website on fun with magnets).
This mine is hoping to get back into business soon but faces some unfair competition with China. It turns out that China is selling rare earth concentrate for about $0.35 per pound which is way below what it costs to produce. Hopefully, the government won't make Molycorp fill in their pit so if prices go up to reasonable levels, they can start producing again.
At least I got my ore samples and some lanthanide concentrate. And no tortoises were injured. What a great day! Watch out Theodore Gray, here I come!
I gave a tortoise worker education class to three workers who were going to fix up the access road to one of the monitoring wells and then I made sure they didn't harm any protected species fixing up the washed out dirt road to the site. It was nice working in some higher elevation habitat. I rarely get to work near juniper trees and blackbrush is a nice change from creosote. I didn't find any tortoise sign but one of the workers has seen them in area before. Best of all, it was nice and cool up there. Vegas is already getting into the 80s so to work in the 60s with a cool breeze was a cool treat.
Actually, the cool treat was the mine tour. Since college, I have been really interested in this mine because it is the only one of its type in the United States. The geology and mineralogy of the area is very unusual. The geologist took me down into their large pit where I got to take a few samples of the carbonatite (a rare carbonate igneous rock— almost all carbonates are sedimentary). To get rid of groundwater in the pit, they are blowing a mist of water into the air evaporating the water.
The geologist took me through the rest of the mine site and we toured the (thankfully quiet) ball mill and flotation tanks. I got about a cup full of lanthanum concentrate. The lanthanides are the wacky elements that only get mentioned briefly even in college chemistry classes. They are considered rare earth elements even though they are not very rare or expensive. On the periodic table, they are the top row of the bottom separate section and include such tongue twisters as dysprosium, neodymium, gadolinium, erbium, terbium, yttrium, and ytterbium (the last four elements named after a Swedish town!).
The mine's discovery and history has an interesting story. Basically, Molycorp claimed the deposit and they spent years trying to find uses for these elements. It turns out that cerium is useful for lighter flints and europium is used in the red phosphor on color TV sets. Gadolinium has unusual magnetic properties and is injected into MRI patients. Of course, neodymium is used in "rare-earth" magnets in speakers, computer hard drives, and toys. (Here is a great website on fun with magnets).
This mine is hoping to get back into business soon but faces some unfair competition with China. It turns out that China is selling rare earth concentrate for about $0.35 per pound which is way below what it costs to produce. Hopefully, the government won't make Molycorp fill in their pit so if prices go up to reasonable levels, they can start producing again.
At least I got my ore samples and some lanthanide concentrate. And no tortoises were injured. What a great day! Watch out Theodore Gray, here I come!
Posted: Wed - March 10, 2004 at 10:16 PM