How to Mine Precious Metals?

 

     The first row of the table above is showing the amount of precious metal in ppm, that is parts per million, or milligrams per kilogram of soil.

     

     Let's elaborate this subject a little. If you sift 1000 tons of soil you step on without losing anything, of course, on average, you will obtain 75 grams of silver, 15 grams of palladium, 5 grams of platinum and only 4 grams of gold from these 1000 tons of soil.

     Of course, such a method is neither economical nor possible without any losses.

     Therefore, in order to mine any metal, ores with concentration levels 100 to 1000 times higher than normal must be found.

     Precious metals are not visible to the naked eye in most cases. In order to get visible to the naked eye, they must have a density of at least 30 ppm.

  

     Therefore, geological surveys and feasibility studies are carried out. It is evaluated whether the project in the region where the ore is detected is economical or not, and only then mining activities can begin.

     For this reason, the rates of precious metals found in the earth's crust and the proven reserve amounts may not be consistent with each other. It is certainly possible for reserve amounts to grow over time, but these reserves can never exceed a certain percentage of their rates in the earth's crust.

     We should examine the second row of our table in this context. The PGM expression you see here means Platinum Group Metals.

     The PGMs are platinum (Pt), palladium (Pd), rhodium (Rh), ruthenium (Ru), osmium (Os), and iridium (Ir). The six metals are often found together, but their relative abundances can vary considerably.