When
we get out of bed in the morning, we step onto the carpet (calcium
carbonate/limestone is used in the carpet backing). Many of us go
directly to the kitchen to switch on the electric light and coffee
pot. They
are made either of
aluminum, iron, copper, glass or ceramic (glass and ceramic are
made entirely from minerals--silica sand, limestone, talc,
lithium, borates, soda ash, and feldspar). While moving around the
kitchen, we will be standing on linoleum (calcium carbonate, clay,
and wollastonite) or ceramic tile. Once we get our cup of coffee,
we may sit down to read the newspaper. Running across the travel
section, we recall that we are planning a trip today, so we take a
moment to consult the Official Airline Guide and then refer to the
Yellow Pages of the telephone book to find the local number for
the airline. All of these papers are filled with kaolin clay and
use lime-stone, sodium sulfate, lime and soda ash in their
processing. Then we fix a piece of toast and sneak a piece of cake
from last night's party (bakery items, such as bread, contain
gypsum as an ingredient, and cakes have a high content of gypsum
in the icing). The plate we are eating off of is made of glass,
ceramic or china, the last being a special form of ceramic.
All of the food that we eat
relies completely upon industrial minerals for its growth and
production. All fertilizers are composed of some combination of
potash, phosphates, nitrogen, sulfur and other minerals. Soils
with a large degree of acidity must be regulated with gypsum,
limestone or sulfur. In fact, without industrial minerals, there
could not be any modem-day agriculture as we know it.
As we get ready for our trip, we
brush our teeth with toothpaste (calcium
carbonate/limestone/sodium carbonate). Ladies put on lipstick
(calcium, carbonate and talc) and powder (talcum), and men might
prepare their hair with hair cream (calcium carbonate).
Other forms of makeup would have various minerals as a
constituent. The lavatory countertop in the bathroom where we
stand is a nice synthetic marble or synthetic onyx (titanium
dioxide, calcium carbonate and alumina hydrate).
The sinks, lavatories, toilets
and similar fixtures throughout the house are kept shiny with
cleansers (silica, pumice, diatomite, feldspars, and limestone).
Kitchen and bathroom tiles are installed, kept in place, and
maintain their waterproof condition with putty and caulking
compounds (limestone and gypsum).
Our automobile is entirely
composed of metals and industrial minerals. Tires contain clays
and calcium carbonate.
Mag wheels are made from dolomite and magnesium. All of the glass
in the car is made entirely from minerals, as is the fiberglass
body now becoming popular on many models.
Many of the components in a car
are now being made of composites, generally combinations of
fiberglass and plastics. Plastics require calcium carbonate,
wollastonite, mica, talc, clays and silica for their manufacture.
The paint which makes our car so attractive is largely composed of
industrial minerals--titanium dioxide, kaolin, clays, calcium
carbonate, micas, talc, silica, wollastonite, and others.
In fact, every speck of all
paints that we encounter today, from that on our house to the
strip down the middle of the road, to the interior of our homes
and offices, and everywhere else, is mainly composed of industrial
minerals.
Gasoline and lubricants come out
of the ground, but also depend upon industrial minerals; because
the drill bit which originally reached the crude oil was made from
iron and faced with industrial diamonds. Drilling fluids, used for
well drilling, are composed almost entirely of barite, bentonite,
attapulgite, mica, perlite, and others. It is necessary to employ
clays and zeolites in the catalytic cracking process for crude
petroleum to arrive as gasoline and lubricants.
Concrete pavement is composed of cement and
aggregates--sand and gravel or crushed stone, such as limestone,
dolomite, granite, lava, and so on. Cement is manufactured from
limestone, gypsum, iron oxide, clays and possibly pozzolan. Even
blacktop has industrial minerals as aggregates.
The buildings we work in are made from
concrete, stone, brick or wood (wood is mined from the earth by
Mother Nature). Many buildings have steel structural members.
Besides the steel being made from iron ore, the steel production
process requires fluorspar for fluxing, bentonite for pelletizing,
and possibly chromite for hardening.
Steel production requires the use of high-grade refractory
bricks and shapes made from bauxite, chromite, zircon, silica,
graphite, kyanite, andalusite, sillimanite and clays.
The interior of our buildings and
homes are enclosed by wallboard or sheetrock (gypsum with
fire-retardant additives, such as clays, perlite, vermiculite
alumina hydrate and borates) joined together with joint cement
(gypsum, mica, clays and calcium carbonates).
Plate-glass windows are made
entirely from industrial minerals.
Our office supplies also come out
of the ground. Pencils (graphite and clays), invoices with
self-contained carbon paper (bentonite, other clays, or zeolites),
pens, paper, calculators, computers, office equipment all
come from metals and industrial minerals. Even some inks contain
calcium carbonate or other fillers.
During our leisure time, our
recreational devices, including golf clubs, tennis rackets,
fishing rods and skis are commonly made from graphite or
fiberglass. Our back-pack frames and pots and pans are often made
from aluminum (all aluminum for whatever usage originates with
bauxite, one of the most widely used industrial minerals).
Our communications and
electronics equipment employ numerous industrial minerals. The
standard product of the electronic industry for years has been the
silicon chip, made from quartz or silica. Optical fibers, made
from glass, are replacing some copper wiring. Television screens
and computer monitors are made of glass, but critical tubes also
contain phosphors made from rare earths or lanthanides, a family
of industrial minerals. Even the super conducting materials that
are presently getting so much attention use industrial minerals
(yttrium, lanthanides, titanium, zirconium, and barite) in their
manufacture.
Filtering and purification are
major duties of the industrial minerals. Preparation of our
drinking water uses minerals for purification and clarification
(limestone, lime and salt), as do the wastewater-treatment plants
(zeolites, soda ash, lime, and salt).
Many of our medical supplies and
pharmaceuticals come directly from minerals, or could not be
manufactured or processed without the use of metals and minerals
from the ground.
Everything comes out of the
ground, one way or another. Everything! Whether Mother
Nature or people do the mining through agriculture, or mankind
does it through mineral extraction. Mining is the basic
building block of our entire society as we know it today. In fact,
the reason why the United States of America is the leading
economic and industrial nation in the world is because we have
figured out how to utilize raw material from the earth better and
faster than other nations.
Our entire social, economic
and industrial base fully depends upon our ability to pull metals
and minerals from the earth and utilize them.
So when you read articles in newspapers and
magazines, or see special documentaries on television about how
bad mining is for the country, you know you are hearing from
individuals who really do not understand what it takes to keep
things going. None of those
people want to go back to living in caves! Or more likely, they
are people who are pushing forward a political agenda (many
without even knowing it) to re-establish government control over
all productive activity (socialism or worse).
Even all of the materials and
equipment used to prevent pollution, or to clean up existing
pollution, will need to be mined out of the ground and/or
processed from metals and minerals taken from the earth.
"Look at the terrible hole
mining left in the ground! “
This is what the
environmentalists say about us. They do not say anything
about the wonderful buildings, homes, highways, modem appliances,
medical wonders, communications and electronics which were created
from that hole in the ground; things which they take for granted
every moment of their lives.
All of the
environmentalist/conservationist individuals and groups running
around trying to shut down agriculture, timber harvesting, mining
and other productive activities, are utilizing the products from
these very same activities in everything they do during every hour
of every day. In fact, the very success of the environmental
movement fully depends upon our modem infrastructure, all
which is a result of metals and minerals being taken out of the
earth. They could not get
by unless we continue our good work!
So the debate is not really
about whether mining and productive activity will continue.
The debate is about who will control it.
This battle has been waging since the beginning of recorded
history. It has not
ended since we have arrived in the modern age.
But we have reached the modern age largely because America
led the way in granting individuals the personal freedom to pursue
mineral extraction in private enterprise, along with all of the
innovation which evolves from it. America established the right of
an individual to own and possess the fruits of his or her hard
work (the right to own your possessions).
All of the noise about the evils of mining
and development (in the name of environmentalism, saving the
planet, global warming, etc) are really a ploy to re-establish
total government control over all means of productive activity,
and to erode your right to the ownership of what you have
earned.
That’s it!
Editorial note: Much of the information
contained here was taken from United States Geological Survey
Bulletin #1958
