Minerals Hidden Under America Can Power the Whole Country — but There's a Major Problem

About 50 miles northeast of Safford in southern Arizona, the century-old Morenci mine sits like a gigantic treasure trove of copper. As temperatures in the nearby Sonoran Desert rise to 118 degrees Fahrenheit, the mine becomes as hot as a freshly-baked cake, per Mining. Every year, millions of tonnes of copper are extracted through digging, which leaves behind towering piles of waste rock that, if utilized, could fulfil some of the pressing electrification needs of the country. In a study published in the journal Science, researchers from Yale University reflected on how this wellspring of valuable mineral waste in America’s mines is being squandered away due to neglect.

Including Morenci, America is home to over 11,000 mines, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Every year, swarms of miners flock to these mines, eager to blast the mills to churn out minerals and grind them into colorful powders. After the minerals have been dug out, the waste rock that remains is often abandoned in something called “mine tailings.” Along with mountains of human-caused litter clamping around the mines, the mining leaves behind slurries of metallic debris, piles of crushed rock, sand, clay, and silt.

As the winds lash onto this toxic debris, they pick it up and spread it in the surrounding territory, triggering waves of environmental pollution and choking hazards. Rocky debris, obviously, is a big matter of concern, but the objective of this particular study surpassed this issue. The goal of researchers was to investigate only the traces of valuable minerals that are dumped and left abandoned in these heaps of waste. If engineers and miners were so careful as to pay attention to these neglected minerals, they could support the country's energy production. 

Plonked down in the bellies of these mining pits is so much lithium in one year of America’s mine waste that it could power up to 10 million electric vehicles if utilized. The same goes for manganese, cobalt, and other rare earth minerals. There’s enough manganese to power 99 million vehicles. Lead researcher Elizabeth Holley from Colorado found out that most of the unrecovered minerals were simply withering and depleting away in streams of other mining operations, including those of gold and zinc.

The research was initiated with the collection of geochemical datasets, which helped the team monitor critical minerals that are mined but remain uncovered. If a mining corporation is digging out 100 tonnes of copper or silver from a mine, then what happens to the minerals still loaded in the waste rocks spewed out by the churn drills? To dig deep into the mystery, researchers documented a database with annual mineral output from the metal mines across the United States.

Holley and her team recovered around 70 elements used in applications like consumer electronics, cell phones, medical devices, satellites, renewable energy resources, fighter jets, and others. “The challenge lies in recovery,” Holley told SciTechDaily. “It’s like getting salt out of bread dough." She added, now that researchers know which mining sites are “low-hanging fruit,” they can develop necessary technologies to recover the forsaken minerals mounding up in shards within the rumpty canyons of these gloomy, asphyxiating mines.

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