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Mining of sulfur from a deposit at the edge of Ijen's crater lake, Indonesia. Mining is the extraction of valuable geological materials and minerals from the surface of the Earth. Mining is required to obtain most materials that cannot be grown through agricultural processes, or feasibly created artificially in a laboratory or factory.
Prehistoric silver extraction is strongly associated with the extraction of the less valuable metal, lead; although evidence of lead extraction technology predates silver by at least 3 millennia. [ 14 ] [ 15 ] Silver and lead extractions are also associated because the argentiferous (silver-bearing) ores used in the process often contains both ...
The act of mining requires different methods of extraction depending on the mineralogy, geology, and location of the resources. Characteristics such as mineral hardness, the mineral stratification, and access to that mineral will determine the method of extraction. Generally, mining is either done from the surface or underground.
Similar to in situ mining, heap leach mining differs in that it places ore on a liner, then adds the chemicals via drip systems to the ore, whereas in situ mining lacks these liners and pulls pregnant solution up to obtain the minerals. Heap leaching is widely used in modern large-scale mining operations as it produces the desired concentrates ...
Solvent extraction and electrowinning (SX/EW) is a two-stage hydrometallurgical process that first extracts and upgrades copper ions from low-grade leach solutions into a solvent containing a chemical that selectively reacts with and binds the copper in the solvent.
Biomining techniques only show economic viability as a complementary process to mining, not as a replacement. Biomining may make traditional mining more environmentally and economically friendly, by re-processing fresh or abandoned mine tailings and the detoxification of copper production concentrates to generate economically valuable copper ...
Brine mining is the extraction of useful materials (chemical elements or compounds) which are naturally dissolved in brine. The brine may be seawater , other surface water , groundwater , or hyper-saline solutions from several industries (e.g., textile industries). [ 1 ]
Extractive metallurgy is a branch of metallurgical engineering wherein process and methods of extraction of metals from their natural mineral deposits are studied. The field is a materials science, covering all aspects of the types of ore, washing, concentration, separation, chemical processes and extraction of pure metal and their alloying to suit various applications, sometimes for direct ...