The mining and resources industries affect all of our lives: From the cars we drive, to the cell phones we use, the utensils we eat with, and the money we spend – all rely on the extraction of valuable minerals, metals and resources from the earth. Today there are literally thousands of mines operating worldwide, extracting the necessary minerals we use to make practically every product on earth.

 

Modern mining is an industry that involves the exploration for and removal of minerals from the earth, economically and with minimum damage to the environment. Mining is important because minerals are major sources of energy as well as materials such as fertilizers and steel.

 

Mining is necessary for nations to have adequate and dependable supplies of minerals and materials to meet their economic and defense needs at acceptable environmental, energy, and economic costs. Some of the nonfuel minerals mined, such as stone, which is a nonmetallic or industrial mineral, can be used directly from the earth.

 

Metallic minerals, which are also nonfuel minerals, conversely, are usually combined in nature with other materials as ores. These ores must be treated, generally with chemicals or heat to produce the metal of interest. Most bauxite ore, for example, is converted to aluminum oxide, which is used to make aluminum metal via heat and additives. Fuel minerals, such as coal and uranium, must also be processed using chemicals and other treatments to produce the quality of fuel desired.

 

There are significant differences in the mining techniques and environmental effects of mining metallic, industrial, and fuel minerals. The discussion here will mostly concentrate on metallic minerals. Mining is a global industry, and not every country has high-grade, large, exceptionally profitable mineral deposits, and the transportation infrastructure to get the mined products to market economically. Some of the factors affecting global mining are environmental regulations, fuel costs, labor costs, access to land believed to contain valuable ore, diminishing ore grades requiring the mining of more raw materials to obtain the target mineral, technology, the length of time to obtain a permit to mine, and proximity to markets, among others. The U.S. mining industry is facing increasing challenges to compete with nations that have lower labor costs—for example, less stringent environmental regulations and lower fuel costs.