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Getting the pay out of pay dirt
This is an excerpt from a writing project I’m working on. The impulse to find and extract gold and silver was one of the drivers of 19th century westward expansion in North America. The discovery of...
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Gilded Blight
After a weekend in the Alma, CO, mining district, I have come around a bit on the merits of gold mining. Oh sure, I have always known that it was a dirty business, what with the mercury, the cyanide,...
View ArticleAntimony is in Short Supply
Antimony, Sb, is an obscure metalloid that rarely gets much notice outside of a few highly specialized areas of technology. The element is most often found in the mineral Stibnite, Sb2S3. Antimony is...
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Uranium Town: Uravan, Colorado
The town of Uravan, Colorado, shows up on maps and road signs. You might think it is a physical town. It sits north of Naturita (pronounced natter reeta), CO, on Hwy 141 about 15 miles up the narrow...
View ArticleYellow Gold and Black Gold in the Ground
Some years back I visited the large CC&V open pit gold mine by Cripple Creek, Colorado. Standing at the bottom of the pit we could see haul trucks busily transferring ore to a staging site....
View ArticleOre Processing and Smelting at MPMM
Ok, I’ll just come out with it and say that I’m a big fan of YouTube. Amidst the large population of silly or stupid videos is a wealth of quite well-done amateur presentations on science and...
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Idaho Cobalt Mining
As interest in lithium batteries continues to ramp upwards, interest in other metals like cobalt used in lithium batteries advances with it. Cobalt has been identified as a particularly problematic...
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Economic Foams and Lithium
While cockeyed optimists are working toward a new age of electric vehicles in the glare of an admiring public, I find myself standing off to the side mired in skepticism. What are the long-term...
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Cripple Creek Gold
A Blacksmith shop is all that remains of Anaconda, Colorado. The discovery of gold in the early 1890’s west of Pikes Peak at Cripple Creek was the last major gold rush in Colorado. This discovery...
View ArticleZombie Oil & Gas Wells in Texas
Much has been written about the gas & oil industry in the US. My aim only is to highlight the leaking, not actively producing, oil & gas wells. Many states have a problem with orphaned and...
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