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| The acid runoff from a mine or mine waste. |
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| A placer deposit that is concentrated in a streambed. |
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| The mining of coal in flat terrain (strip mining). |
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| average crustal abundance |
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| The percentage of a particular element in the composition of the earth’s crust. |
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| : An iron deposit consisting essentially of iron oxides and chert occurring in prominent layers or bands of brown or red and black. |
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| An off-white, grayish, brown, or reddish brown rock composed of a mixture of various hydrous aluminum oxides and aluminum hydroxides. |
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| Remnant of a ancient alluvial placer deposit that was concentrated beneath a former stream and that is now preserved as a bench on a hillside. |
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| A submarine hydrothermal vent associated with a mid-oceanic spreading center that has emitted or is emitting a “smoke” of metallic sulfide particles |
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| The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act of 1980. See Superfund. |
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| The enrichment of a deposit of an element, expressed as the ratio of the element’s abundance in the deposit to its average crustal abundance. |
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| contact-metamorphic deposit |
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Definition
| Deposits found at or near the contact between magma and rock during intrusion. Some examples are cooper, tin, zinc and tungsten |
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| The mining of coal by cutting into and following the coal seam around the perimeter of the hill. |
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| In a magma, the sinking of crystals because of their greater density, sometimes aided by magmatic convection. (See gravity separation |
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| A process of using cyanide to dissolve and recover gold and silver from ore. |
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| A mineral deposit, especially of a metal, in which the minerals occur as scattered particles in the rock, but in sufficient quantity to make the deposit a commercially worthwhile ore. |
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| The excavation of earth material from the bottom of a body of water by floating barge or raft equipped to scoop up, discharge by conveyors, and process or transport materials. |
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| : A nonclastic sedimentary rock composed primarily of minerals produced when a saline solution becomes concentrated by evaporation of the water; especially a deposit of salt that precipitated from a restricted or enclosed body of seawater or from the water of a salt lake. |
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| The process of concentrating minerals with distinct non-wettable properties by floating them in liquids containing soapy frothing agents such as pine oil. |
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| Deposits of stratified sand, gravel, and silt that have been removed from a glacier by meltwater streams. |
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| Methods used in the recovery of high density ore minerals such as gold, platinum— group metals. |
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| A mineral deposit with a high concentration of a desired element. |
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| A mining technique by which high-pressure jets of water are used to dislodge unconsolidated rock or sediment so that it can be processed. |
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| (hot water) deposits that originate from mineral – rich fluids that are squeezed from cooling magma bodies during crystallization. Can create hydrothermal vein deposits -- lodes. Associated with elements such as gold, quartz, lead, zinc and silver. |
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| A mineral deposit consisting of a zone of veins in consolidated rock, as opposed to a placer deposit. |
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| A mineral deposit in which the mineral content is minimal but still exploitable at a profit. |
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| A small irregular black to brown, laminated concretionary mass consisting primarily of manganese minerals with some iron oxides and traces of other metallic minerals, abundant on the floors of the world’s oceans. |
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| Usually volcanogenic, often rich in zinc and sometimes in lead. |
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| A localized concentration of naturally occurring mineral material (e.g., a metallic ore or a nonmetallic mineral), usually of economic value, without regard to its mode of origin. |
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| Known mineral deposits that are recoverable under present conditions but as yet undeveloped. The term excludes potential ore. |
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| The mining of coal that underlies the tops of mountains. |
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| Mining from open excavations, most commonly for low-grade copper and iron deposits, and coal. |
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| Any mineral (metallic, non-metallic) that can be mined at a profit. |
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| The part of an ore, usually metallic, that is economically desirable. |
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| An exceptionally coarse-grained igneous rock with interlocking crystals, usually found as irregular dikes, lenses, or veins, especially at the margins of batholiths. |
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| A surficial mineral deposit formed by settling from streams of mineral particles from weathered debris. |
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| A copper deposit, usually of low grade, in which the copper-bearing minerals occur in disseminated grains and/or in veinlets through a large volume of rock. |
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| The separation of a solid substance from a solution by a chemical reaction. |
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| A general term for metamorphism that affects an extensive area. |
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| Processes of near-surface mineral deposition, in which oxidation produces acidic solutions that leach metals, carry them downward, and reprecipitate them, thus enriching sulfide minerals already present. |
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| The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977. |
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| An industrial plant that mechanically and chemically produces metals from their ores. |
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| Unwanted rock or waste deposits when a material is removed from the earth’s surface by mining, dredging quarrying, or excavation |
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| Surficial mining, in which the resource is exposed by removing the overburden |
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| The worthless rock material discarded from mining operations |
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| A thin, sheet-like igneous intrusion into a crevice. |
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| Of volcanic origin; for example, volcanogenic sediments or ore deposits. |
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