AS THE WORLD'S PRIME MINERAL DEPOSITS DWINDLE AND DEMAND GROWS, TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION IN MINERAL EXTRACTION BECOMES MORE IMPORTANT.

AS THE WORLD'S PRIME MINERAL DEPOSITS DWINDLE AND DEMAND GROWS, TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION IN MINERAL EXTRACTION BECOMES MORE IMPORTANT. THE CHALLENGE TAKES MANY FORMS, BUT THE NEED TO EXTRACT LEANER, MORE FINELY DISSEMINATED DEPOSITS IS A COMMON REQUIREMENT. ALSO, AS THE REMAINING DEPOSITS GET POORER, THE INCENTIVE TO TO REWORK TAILINGS LEFT BY PREVIOUS OPERATIONS GROWS MORE COMPELLING. ONE REQUIREMENT IS IMMEDIATELY OBVIOUS: IMPROVED PROCESSES FOR SEPARATION OF THE DESIRED MINERAL CONSTITUENTS FROM THE OFTEN GREATER MASS OF UNWANTED MINERALS. PRELIMINARY EXPERIMENTS HAVE CONFIRMED CRUDE BATCH SEPARATION OF MINERALS ACCORDING TO THEIR RESPONSE TO COMPETING ELECTROSTATIC AND GRAVITY FORCES. AN ELECTROSTATIC TABLE HAS BEEN CONCEIVED TO ALLOW CONTINUOUS OPERATION BASED ON THE SAME PRINCIPLES. THE PROCESS IS EXPECTED TO BE RELATIVELY INSENSITIVE TO PARTICLE SIZE AND TO REQUIRE LITTLE POWER AND NO CONSUMABLE CHEMICALS. A LABORATORY TABLE WILL BE BUILT AND TESTED WITH SINGLE MINERALS AND MIXTURES OF THOSE MINERALS TO CONFIRM PARTICULATE BEHAVIOR AND SEPAR- ABILITY PREDICTIONS. CONCENTRATION FACTORS, RECOVERY, AND THROUGHPUT WILL BE MEASURED FOR MAN-MADE MIXTURES AND NATURAL ORES.