The Occurrence and Concentration of Rare Earth Elements in Acid Mine Drainage and Treatment Byproducts. Part 2: Regional Survey of Northern and Central Appalachian Coal Basins
Abstract
Many modern industries rely on rare earth elements (REEs) to produce products that are essential to both civil and defense applications. In a prior study (Vass et al., 2019), the authors showed that REE grades in acid mine drainage (AMD) and associated byproduct precipitates from AMD treatment (AMDp) warrant evaluation as a feedstock for REE production. The current work extends that effort through a broad survey of 141 AMD treatment sites in Northern and Central Appalachia. In this study, 185 raw AMD and 623 AMDp field samples were obtained and analyzed to assess the REE and major metal concentrations. Results show that an average of 282 μg/L and 724 g/tonne of REEs occur in AMD and AMDp respectively. Additionally, both basins contained similar distributions of REEs, and these distributions tended to favor heavy and critical REEs when compared with traditional REE ore deposits. Geospatial analysis identified a total resource of 340 tonnes stored at the 141 sites sampled in this study. While this analysis did not quantify the basin-wide REE inventory, it does indicate the impact that processing cut-off grades will have on the overall AMDp resource base.
- Authors:
-
[1];
- West Virginia Water Research Inst., Morgantown, WV (United States)
- Virginia Polytechnic Inst. and State Univ. (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, VA (United States). Virginia Tech Mining and Minerals Engineering
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- West Virginia Water Research Inst., Morgantown, WV (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Fossil Energy (FE)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1577122
- Grant/Contract Number:
- FE0026927
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 36; Journal Issue: 5; Journal ID: ISSN 2524-3462
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 01 COAL, LIGNITE, AND PEAT; Acid Mine Drainage; Rare Earth Elements; Coal Byproducts
Citation Formats
Vass, Christopher R., Noble, Aaron, and Ziemkiewicz, Paul F. The Occurrence and Concentration of Rare Earth Elements in Acid Mine Drainage and Treatment Byproducts. Part 2: Regional Survey of Northern and Central Appalachian Coal Basins. United States: N. p., 2019.
Web. doi:10.1007/s42461-019-00112-9.
Vass, Christopher R., Noble, Aaron, & Ziemkiewicz, Paul F. The Occurrence and Concentration of Rare Earth Elements in Acid Mine Drainage and Treatment Byproducts. Part 2: Regional Survey of Northern and Central Appalachian Coal Basins. United States. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42461-019-00112-9
Vass, Christopher R., Noble, Aaron, and Ziemkiewicz, Paul F. Tue .
"The Occurrence and Concentration of Rare Earth Elements in Acid Mine Drainage and Treatment Byproducts. Part 2: Regional Survey of Northern and Central Appalachian Coal Basins". United States. https://doi.org/10.1007/s42461-019-00112-9. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1577122.
@article{osti_1577122,
title = {The Occurrence and Concentration of Rare Earth Elements in Acid Mine Drainage and Treatment Byproducts. Part 2: Regional Survey of Northern and Central Appalachian Coal Basins},
author = {Vass, Christopher R. and Noble, Aaron and Ziemkiewicz, Paul F.},
abstractNote = {Many modern industries rely on rare earth elements (REEs) to produce products that are essential to both civil and defense applications. In a prior study (Vass et al., 2019), the authors showed that REE grades in acid mine drainage (AMD) and associated byproduct precipitates from AMD treatment (AMDp) warrant evaluation as a feedstock for REE production. The current work extends that effort through a broad survey of 141 AMD treatment sites in Northern and Central Appalachia. In this study, 185 raw AMD and 623 AMDp field samples were obtained and analyzed to assess the REE and major metal concentrations. Results show that an average of 282 μg/L and 724 g/tonne of REEs occur in AMD and AMDp respectively. Additionally, both basins contained similar distributions of REEs, and these distributions tended to favor heavy and critical REEs when compared with traditional REE ore deposits. Geospatial analysis identified a total resource of 340 tonnes stored at the 141 sites sampled in this study. While this analysis did not quantify the basin-wide REE inventory, it does indicate the impact that processing cut-off grades will have on the overall AMDp resource base.},
doi = {10.1007/s42461-019-00112-9},
journal = {Mining, Metallurgy & Exploration},
number = 5,
volume = 36,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Oct 01 00:00:00 EDT 2019},
month = {Tue Oct 01 00:00:00 EDT 2019}
}
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