Chapter two
Basic principles of
Exploration, Development and
Exploitation
By: Bethelihem T.
Session topic:
Basic principles of exploration and exploitation
Objectives:
By the end of the lesson students will
be able to:-
Define exploration.
Differentiate exploration and exploitation.
Identify the principal steps of exploration and
exploitation.
Exploration and
Exploitation
Mineral exploration is the process of finding
ore (commercially viable concentrations of
minerals) to mine.
Mineral exploration is a much more
intensive, organized and professional form
of mineral prospecting and, though it
frequently uses the services of prospecting,
the process of mineral exploration on the
whole is much more involved.
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Exploration is viewed as integral components of
the arsenal of weapons available to the modern
prospector whether, geological, geochemical or
geophysical.
Precise mapping of the rock formations, their
structural patterns (peculiar if any) in the field,
supplemented by analytical and microscopic
studies of samples in the laboratory together with
geological interpretation, will enable the geologist
to locate hidden or surface ore deposits and
delineate them for development.
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Exploration field activities take place as
part of a strategy (often called a “play”) to
locate and define a particular economically
mineable mineral commodity (ore) in a
mineral province.
Large exploration plays are often broken
down into individual projects (often a
particular tenement group) and each
project may contain one or more
prospects.
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The prospect could be outcropping mineralization, an
old mine, an area selected on the basis of some
geological idea, or perhaps some anomalous feature of
the environment (usually a geophysical or geochemical
measurement) that can be interpreted as having a close
spatial link with ore.
The exploration geologist job is to generate new
prospects and then to explore them in order to locate
and define any ore body that might lie within them.
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Stages of mineral
exploration
Province scale - area
selection
Area selection is based on applying
The theories behind ore genesis,
The knowledge of known ore occurrences and the
method of their formation,
To known geological regions via the study of
geological maps,
To determine potential areas where the particular
class of ore deposit being sought may exist.
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Political, sovereign and other
associated risks
Any area selected for mineral exploration also carries
various forms of sovereign and other associated risks;
That is, the risk that even if a commercially viable
deposit is present,
• political, environmental and social factors may
make the discovery and development of the
mineral resource unviable.
The ultimate result of an area selection process is the
pegging or notification of exploration licenses, known
as tenements.
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Target generation - Regional
Scale
The target generation phase
Involves investigations of the geology via
mapping, geophysics and
Conducting geochemical or intensive geophysical
testing of the surface and subsurface geology.
In some cases, for instance in areas covered by soil,
alluvium and platform cover, drilling may be
performed directly as a mechanism for generating
targets.
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The proceeding steps
are
Geophysical methods
Remote sensing
Geochemical methods
Resource evaluation
Reserve
definition
Extraction 10
Exploitation
The ultimate goal of mineral exploration is
the extraction,
beneficiation and
profitable and beneficial sale of mineral
commodities.
Extraction methods may vary considerably
and it is the discipline of engineers trained
in mining engineering to determine the
most safe, cost effective and efficient
method of mining the ore body. 11
Quiz
Which one of the following
pictures is exploration process
and which one is Exploitation?
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X-ray Geochemistry
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Excavatio
n
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Geophysics
15
Surface
excavation
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Outcrop
Investigation
5
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6
Geological Structure
orientation
measurement
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Blasting
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Mapping
Compiled by: Samuel Abraham 20
Core sample
study
9
21
10
Sample study using hand
lens 22
11
Stream sediment
panning 23
Hydraulic
Excavation
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Principal steps in the exploration
and
exploitation of mineral deposits
1. Mineral exploration: to discover a mineral
deposit.
2. Feasibility study: to prove its commercial
viability.
3. Mine development: establishment of the entire
infrastructure.
4. Mining: extraction of ore from the ground.
5. Mineral processing: milling of the ore,
separation of ore minerals from gangue material,
separation of the ore minerals into concentrates,
e.g. copper concentrate; separation and
refinement of industrial mineral products.
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6. Smelting: recovering metals from the
mineral concentrates.
7. Refining: purifying the metal.
8. Marketing: shipping the product (or metal
concentrate if not smelted and refined at the
mine) to the buyer, e.g. custom smelter,
manufacturer.
9. Closure: before a mine has reached the end
of its life, there has to be a closure
management plan in place that details and
costs the proposed
Compiled closure
by: Samuel Abraham strategies. 26
Geology in the exploration
sequence
We can’t think exploration with out geology.
Exploration ideas can be raised based on the
geological knowledge that we might have
about the area.
Therefore, the initial point for exploration is
knowledge about the regional geology.
Geological mapping is required from regional
scale to very detail scale.
Geological mapping is problem solving in
exploration. 27
Geological mapping can be of different
scale, based on how detail it is required up
on the exploration sequence.
It becomes detail as the exploration
advances from a prospect in to target
generation and target drilling stages.
Before extraction and throughout,
geological structural studies are very
crucial, on the other hand geology controls
the quality of the mineral being extracted in
all stages.
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Exploration Program
Design
Obviously not all prospects that are
generated will make it through to a mine.
Most will be discarded at the target
generation or target drilling stages.
The large number of prospects initially
generated decline through the exploration
stages in an exponential manner.
Success of exploration program depends on
the number of initial prospects and the
prospect wastage. 29
There are only two ways to turn an
unsuccessful exploration program into a
successful one;
the exploration program either has to get
bigger (i.e. increase the starting number of
prospects generated) or
the explorationist has to get smarter.
Some regional exploration methods involve
widespread systematic collection of
geophysical or geochemical measurements and
typically result in the production of large
numbers of anomalies.
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This is an empirical exploration style.
Generally little will be known about any of these
anomalies other than the fact of their existence, but
any one anomaly could reflect an ore body and must
be regarded as a prospect to be followed up with a
preliminary assessment usually a field visit.
The opposite type of prospect generation
involves applying the theories of ore
forming processes to the known geology
and mineralization of a region, so as to
predict where ore might be found. This is a
conceptual exploration approach
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Conceptual exploration will generally lead to only
a small number of prospects being defined.
These are much more likely to be “quality”
prospects, in the sense that the chances are
higher that any one of these prospects will
contain an ore body compared to prospects
generated by empirical methods.
Empirical and conceptual generation and
targeting are two end members of a spectrum of
exploration techniques, and few actual
exploration programs would be characterized as
purely one or the other
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Conceptual generation and targeting tends to play
a major role where there are high levels of regional
geological knowledge and the style of
mineralization sought is relatively well understood.
Such conditions usually apply in established and
well-known mining camps such as (for example)
the Bushveld region of South Africa.
Empirical techniques tend to play a greater role in
green field exploration programs, where the levels
of regional geological knowledge are much lower
and applicable mineralization models less well
defined.
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The End of Chapter 2
Compiled by: Samuel Abraham 34