Chapter 1

INTRODUCTION

MINERAL RAW MATERIALS

1. Background:

Mineral elements are elements of the periodic table in pure forms.Every naturally occuring thing on earth that has mass and occupies space is a raw material. Raw materials are minerals not found in their pure state but as mixtures of other raw materials found as ore or in crude forms. Any area of tne earth that a particular mineral is found in concentrated form as ore(solid state) or as crude(liquid state) is called the mineral deposit. The extraction of mineral from it's deposit is called Mining. Natural occuring minerals become resources only after extraction and it's economic value has been mastered. The natural resources are normally seen as source of wealth that occur naturally.

WEALTH RESOURCES

There are two different kinds of wealth resources namely:

a. Natural Resources.

b. Man Made Resources.

Natural Resources are further divided into two types namely:

a. Renewable Natural Resources.

b. Non Renewable Natural Resources

Renewable Natural Resources

Renewable Natural Resources are natural resources which will replenish to replace the portion depleted by usage and consumption, either through natural reproduction or other reocurring processes in a human time scale. Renewable Natural Resources are found as renewable energy source.Biological material resources are renewed by regeneration process and are mined as Bio-waste deposits.

There are six major renewable energy sources namely:

a. Food Production:

Agricultural Resources are renewable and includes, Agricultural commodities which means those plants and animals useful to human beings, produced by agriculture and includes, but is not limited to, forages and sod crops, grains and feed crops, field crops, dairy and dairy products, poultry and poultry products, cervidae, livestock, including breeding and grazing, equine, fish, and other aquacultural products, bees and bee products, berries, herbs, fruits, vegetables, flowers, seeds, grasses, nursery stock, mushrooms.

b. Solar energy from the sun.

c. Geothermal energy from heat inside the earth.

d. Wind energy.

e. Biomass from plants and animals.

f. Hydropower from flowing water