Mineville District

Location: New York, United States (44.088, -73.525 approx.)

Commodities: iron; thorium; uranium; phosphoric acid; rare earth elements

Geology

“Dumps in the Mineville district are estimated to have about 18,000,000 short tons of tailings. Approximately two-thirds, or at least 10,000,000 tons, of these tailings was derived from apatite rich iron ores. The amount of apatite in the tailings from the apatite-rich dumps was calculated from data given by McKeown and Klemic (1956, p. 21-22). These figures indicated that 8 percent of the tailings is apatite, or that approximately 800,000 short tons of apatite occurs in the dumps. The average apatite contains about 0.17 percent Th02 and 0.038 percent U308 (McKeown and Klemic, 1956, p. 15). The amount of apatite in the dumps would contain 1,360 short tons of Th02 and 304 tons of U308. In addition, the apatite is rich in rare earths, and McKeown and Klemic (1956, p. 15) reported that 12 specimens had an average rare-earth-oxide content of 13 percent. Thus, the dumps would also contain 104,000 short tons of total rare-earth oxides. Spectrographic analyses given by McKeown and Klemic (1956, p. 12) indicated that yttrium is one of the principal rare earths. Hence, these tailings are also a potential source for the yttrium-group rare earths.” (Staatz and others (1979)) Although the presence of iron ore was known since 1775, the first significant operating mine in the Mineville district was the Cheever Mine, located north of Port Henry, which was opened in 1820 by Charles Fisher. Soon thereafter, the same owner started the works for the Fisher Hill Mine that was worked intermittently until 1893; later exploration in the 1920’s proved that the Fisher Hill ore body would yield at least 40,000,000 long tons of ore and in 1941 it began operations as a Defense Plant Corporation project of the Republic Steel Corporation (Anderson and Jones 1945). (Lupulescu and Pyle (2008)) “The cost of milling the tailing piles has not been calculated. The possible economic products of the apatite from the Mineville area are thorium, uranium, total rare-earth oxides, yttrium oxide, and phosphoric acid. The cost of milling the tailings under various conditions can be calculated. If only thorium and uranium were recovered and they could be sold for $30/lb, then the value of the thorium and uranium per ton of tailings would be about $10. Rare earths and phosphorus, however, would undoubtedly play an important part in any economic recovery of thorium and uranium. In 1978 total rare-earth oxides were selling for about $0.60/lb and Y2O3, about $7/lb. The value of the total rare-earth oxides would be equivalent to $12.48/ton of tailings, if a market could be found for this amount of rare earths at 1978 prices. If Y2O3 made up 10 percent or more of the total rare earths, then the added value due to the Y2O3 would more than double the value due to rare earths in a ton of tailings. Because the apatite would be taken into solution to recover the thorium, coproducts of uranium, rare earths, and phosphorus could be cheaply produced.” (Staatz and others (1979)) The Mineville district produced two distinct varieties of iron ore (Birkinbine 1890): magnetite-apatite and magnetite-silicate ore. The magnetite-apatite ore was produced from what was called the “Old Bed” and the magnetite-silicate ore came from the “New Bed”. These names were applied to the ore mined from different mining works. The name “Old Bed” was derived from the initial opening made in 1824 at the eastern end of the Sanford Pit. In 1829 the “Old Bed” was mined by the Ore Bed Company at the Sanford Pit and the 21 Mine. It was thought to represent a series of lenses “lying en echelon, or nearly parallel, of varying thickness and dip” (Birkinbine 1890). New mine works were made northwest of the “Old Bed” and produced magnetite-silicate ore. These works opened the “New Bed” along a large area. The “New Bed” was apparently a continuous vein, but was separated in different sub-layers and complicated by “horses” (faults). Hall in his “Laurentian Magnetic Iron Ore Deposits of Northern New York” considered the “Old Bed” and “New Bed” to be located at different levels in the metamorphic succession (Birkinbine 1890). (Lupulescu and Pyle (2008))

Published resource estimates

As compiled by USGS USMIN from the cited studies. Resource classes follow the source; "approximate" flags values USMIN reports as approximations. These are not current company reserve statements.

Record imported from USGS USMIN ver. 4.0 (June 2019). Developments after that date appear on facility records, not here; see the methodology.