Outline of mining

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to mining:

Mining – extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, usually (but not always) from an ore body, vein or (coal) seam. Any material that cannot be grown from agricultural processes, or created artificially in a laboratory or factory, is usually mined.

Basic concepts

Geology of mining

Basic terms

Mineral
Rock (geology), an aggregate material usually made up of a number of minerals
Ore, rock containing a desired mineral
- Ore genesis, the geological processes by which ore is formed and deposited
- Ore grade, the amount of a desired mineral or metal that a quantity of ore contains
  - high grade ores are rich in the mineral desired, low-grade ores have less of the mineral desired
- Gangue, minerals within the ore that are not desired; these are removed during ore processing
- Vein (geology) a geological formation that often contains ore
Overburden, the material on top of a given mineral deposit (in surface mining, it has to be removed)

Finding ore

Materials mined

Some examples of materials that are extracted from the earth by mining include:

Base metals
- Bauxite (Aluminium)
- Cassiterite (Tin)
- Chromite (Chromium)
- Cinnabar (Mercury)
- Cobaltite (Cobalt)
- Coltan (Niobium and Tantalum)
- Columbite (Niobium)
- Copper – see List of copper ores
- Ilmenite (Titanium)
- Iron ore (Iron)
- Galena (Lead)
- Magnesite (Magnesium)
- Malachite (Copper)
- Molybdenite (Molybdenum)
- Pentlandite (Nickel)
- Pyrolusite (Manganese)
- Scheelite (Tungsten)
- Sphalerite (Zinc)
- Tantalite (Tantalum)
- Tin
- Wolframite (Tungsten)
Baryte (Barium)
Beryl (Beryllium and Gemstones)
Clay
Construction aggregates
- Gravel – see Gravel pit
- Sand – see Sand mining
Diamonds
dolomite (ornamental stone, Magnesium)
Fossil fuels
- Coal – see Coal mining
- Oil sands
- Oil shale – see Oil shale industry and Shale oil extraction
Gemstones
Kaolinite
Limestone
Phosphorite (Phosphate)
Precious metals
- Gold – see Gold mining
- Silver – see Silver mining
- Platinum
Potash
Rare-earth elements
Slate – see Slate industry
Rock salt
Stone – see Quarry
- List of decorative stones
Sulfur
Uranium ore

Types of mining and techniques

Surface mining

Surface mining, mining conducted down into the ground, but with the sky open above
Open-pit mining, where the overburden is removed and put in a different location, leaving a large pit at the end.
Strip mining, where the overburden is stripped off and placed onto the area where the mineral (usually coal) has already been mined out, allowing the surface to be returned to roughly how it was before
Mountaintop removal mining, where the overburden on a mountain is pushed off the mountain into the adjacent valley
Quarrying
Placer mining
Dredging
Hydraulic mining, using high-pressure jets of water to blast soil or hillsides apart

Underground mining

Sub-surface mining, mining conducted underground
- Two main types of underground mining, classified by the characteristic of the rock being mined:
  - Underground mining (hard rock)
  - Underground mining (soft rock)
- There are three directions by which an underground mine may be conducted:
Drift mining, mining horizontally
Shaft mining, mining vertically
Slope mining, mining at an inclined angle
- Stoping is the process of extracting out the ore from underground, leaving a hole called a stope
Room and pillar
Longwall mining
Retreat mining
Fire-setting, a method used in stoping by setting fires to timber and letting the resulting collapse break up the rock

Other methods

Mining equipment

Excavation

Heavy machinery

Steam shovel, used from the 19th century to the 1930s
Power shovel, derived from the steam shovel, but using electricity instead of steam
Excavator, derived from the steam shovel, but using hydraulics or pneumatics instead of steam
Draglines use buckets attached to long cable lines, rather than affixed to a beam
Bucket-wheel excavator, the largest moving land machines ever built
Dredge

Blasting

Rock blasting

Explosives
- Gunpowder or black powder, used from the 17th century to the mid-19th century
- Dynamite, used from the mid-19th century into the 20th century, still used some today
- ANFO, used from the 20th century, and the primary explosive in use today
Blasting gear
- Detonator, a small explosive charge used to set off the main explosive
- Blasting machine, a device used to generate or send an electric charge to the detonators

Transport

Vertical equipment
Equipment for transporting miners
- Man engine
- Mantrip

Engines used in mining

Liquid mining

Safety and environment

Processing

Ore dressing
- General methods of ore processing
  - Froth flotation
  - Trommel
- Methods peculiar to gold placer mining. Gold is much denser than many other minerals, various methods use this to separate it out:
  - Gold panning, uses a pan in water to wash material
  - Rocker box
  - Sluice box
  - Drywasher, used where there is insuffician
Extractive metallurgy
- Pyrometallurgy, using heat
  - Smelting
  - Cupellation
- Hydrometallurgy, using aqueous solutions
  - Leaching, using an acid (lixiviant) to remove. Commonly used for gold and copper
  - Amalgamation, using liquid mercury to extract the metal. Used to separate out silver and gold.
- Electrometallurgy, using electricity to separate out metals

Mining waste

Spoil tip, a pile where overburden is placed (which has NOT been processed)
Tailings, waste mineral material (gangue) leftover AFTER processing
Slag, material left over from smelting
Acid mine drainage, liquid leached out of mines

Mining hazards and safety

Geography of mining

Mining, by country

Mining of specific minerals, by country

History of mining

Economics of mining

List of mining companies

Future of mining

People associated with mining

miner, is a person who is involved in the act of mining
prospector, a person who is expert in searching for and assessing the value of

Mining scholars

Georg Agricola - author of De re metallica
Harrison Schmitt - American geologist, astronaut, retired senator
Paul Worsey
Richard Redmayne
Robert Hunt (scientist)
Ronald F. Tylecote
Russell Walter Fox
Frank T. M. White

Organizations

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
National Mining Hall of Fame, in the United States

Leaders and innovators in mining

Archimedes – invented the Archimedes' screw
Charles Steen
Daniel Guggenheim
Ed Schieffelin
George Stephenson – inventor of the Geordie lamp
Henry Beecher Dierdorff – American inventor of mining equipment
Herbert Hoover, engineer and writer on mining engineering (later President of the United States)
Horace Austin Warner Tabor
Humphry Davy – inventor of the Davy lamp
Meyer Guggenheim
Paddy Martinez
William Boyce Thompson
William Reid Clanny – inventor of the first safety lamp

External links