Mineral Resources India - Iron, Coal, Aluminium, Copper, Lead, Zinc

Mineral Resources India – Iron, Coal, Aluminium, Copper, Lead, Zinc

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Mineral Resources India – Iron, Coal, Aluminium, Copper, Lead, Zinc

Metallic Ferrous Containing iron contents (Iron ores, Ni, Co, Mn etc.)
Non-Ferrous Gold, Silver, Cu, Pb, Al, Zn etc.
Non Metallic Organic Fossil fuels Coal, Petroleum etc.
Inorganic Mica, Limestone, Graphite, Gypsom etc.

 

Mineral Resources India


Iron & Coal Industries

Iron Ores

  • Magnetite Best quality iron ore containing 72% iron (Have magnetic properties)
  • Hematite 60 – 70% iron content
  • Limonite 40 – 60% iron content
  • Siderite ~ 40% iron content

Iron-coal industry

  • Iron ore + coke + limestone + heat Pig iron
  • Pig iron ore processing cast-iron, wrought iron, steel and variety of alloys

Iron to Steel Formation - Processing of Iron Ore

  • Therefore, Essential inputs are:
  • iron ore, coking coal and limestone
  • water for cooling
  • energy for heating
  • Steel industry also requires dolomite, manganese etc. but in small quantities
  • Hence their presence is not the main deciding factor for the location

Deciding locations for iron-coal industry

  • Near Forest
  • Near Coal Mines
  • Near Coastal Areas

Near Forest

  • Until the end of medieval period, iron production was done on small scale
  • Energy was immobile (No wires to move electricity, No trains to move coal)
  • To produce five tons of iron, you had to chop down one acre of forest to get sufficient charcoal
  • Therefore, wood supply was primary factor for deciding location
  • Hence, smelters were usually setup near forest areas
  • Even in Modern times, Visvesvaraya Iron and Steel Plant (Karnataka) was setup near jungle to get wood-charcoal
  • Later it was switched to hydro-electricity from Sarawati river

Near coal fields

  • During the Industrial Revolution, iron and steel industry were setup near coalmines, due to following reasons –
  • The coalfield region had a tradition of iron working based on charcoal
  • As a result coalfield areas already had the labour and technology
  • In Britain, iron ore was found embedded with coal seams same area provided both iron ore + coal
  • During that era, to process 1 tons of iron ore, you needed 8-12 tons of coal
  • Railway engines were also inefficient
  • So, weight-wise, it was cheaper to transport iron ore to coalfields rather than transporting coal to iron ore site

Near coastal areas

  • By early 20th century the coal and iron ore mines in US-Europe started getting depleted
  • So, they started importing iron ore from other countries
  • As a result, the iron space and steel industry started moving toward coastal sites to reduce cost of transporting ores from port to factory via railways
  • Example Steel plants at Vishakhapatnam, Ratnagiri, Mangalore

Need for “Coking coal

  • Iron ore has iron oxide but we’re only interested in iron
  • So, we’ve to get rid of the “oxide” part
  • Hence to remove the “oxide” part we blend it with carbon to form “Carbon dioxide”.
  • Coking coal has high concentration of carbon, compared to cheap varieties of coal like Lignite
  • Therefore, you’ve to mix the coking coal with iron ore

Extraction of Iron from its ore

  • For heating you can use other variety of coal / even electricity

Steel Industries India

  • Jharkhand Jamshedpur (TISCO), Bokaro
  • West Bengal Durgapur, Burnpur
  • Odisha Rourkela
  • Chhattisgarh Bhilai
  • Andhra Pradesh Vishakhapatnam
  • Karnataka Vishveshwarya
  • Tamil Nadu Salem

Aluminium-Bauxite Refining

Bauxite to Alumina

  • Aluminum is an abundant mineral in the earth crust
  • But for mining or commercial scale exploitation, you require significant concentration of bauxite ore at one particular site
  • Bauxite occurs frequently in the tropical areas where limestone rocks are exposed to weathering
  • First, Bauxite ore is crushed, washed and mixed with caustic soda to remove impurities
  • Then it is dried in large furnaces to remove moisture content You get alumina
  • During this phase, ~50% or more weight loss happens
  • Hence, this process (of converting bauxite to Alumina) is done near the raw material side
  • Because less weight less transportation cost

Bauxite to Alumina to Aluminium

Alumina to aluminum (By Electrolysis)

  • The white powder of alumina is dissolved in a bath Electric current is passed through it using carbon electrodes alumina is converted to aluminum
  • Requires massive amount of electricity
  • Hence, aluminum smelting facilities are set up near sources of cheap electricity, rather than near to raw material or near to final market

Aluminium Industry → India

  • UP Hindalco (Birla)
  • Odisha Hirakund (Birla), Jharsuguda (Vedanta)
  • Chhattisgarh Korba (Vedanta)
  • BALCO Ratnagiri, Maharashtra
  • NALCO Koratpur, Odisha
  • MALCO Mettur, TN

Copper Refining India

  • With 20th century, copper became important for electric industry
  • As the demand for copper increased, new mining-smelting technologies developed to utilize even lower quality ores
  • Location principle for copper and aluminum industries same, but smelting process is different

Concentrating ore (Copper ore → Blister copper)

  • Copper ore is soaked in water and mixed with oils
  • The copper revering matter floats on the top, and is separated out for further processing
  • After this “concentrating” stage, barely 2.5% of the original matter remains
  • Less weight less transportation cost, therefore, copper concentrating mills are set up near the raw material (mines)
  • After this stage, sulfur and oxygen impurities are separated from the concentrated copper ore & we get “blister copper”.
  • Even in the state, the weight loss ratio is significant, therefore smelting is usually done near raw material

Copper Smelting

Blister to copper (Electrolysis)

  • Although Blister copper is 99% pure metal, but still unsuitable for manufacturing electronic wires, utensils etc.
  • Because it contains impurities of gold, silver, lead and zinc
  • Therefore, blister copper is refined via electrolysis method
  • Blister copper is immersed in a bath of copper sulphate, electricity is passed and impurities are removed
  • Here, the weight loss ratio is extremely small. (~1%)
  • So, there is no economic factor to setup copper refining factories near the raw material

Copper Refineries → India

  • Hindustan Copper Khetri, Jhunjnu district, Rajasthan
  • BACLO Korba, Chhattisgarh
  • Hindalco (Birla) Dahej, Bharuch district of Gujarat
  • Sterlite Industries Tutikorin, Tamil Nadu

Acid Industry

  • From the Copper refining process, by products can be used for making phosphoric acid, sulphuric acid
  • Copper smelting SO2gas Used in making Sulphuric Acid
  • Sulphuric acid + Rock Phosphate Phosphoric Acid which can further it can be used for making fertilizers
  • Rock Phosphate is usually imported, because SO2gas is difficult to transport, so, better import rock phosphate here
  • Hence, such acid industries are located in the vicinity of Copper refineries
  • Nowadays, copper refining companies have integrated plants to produce such acids within their premises

Copper Industry Challenges in India

  • Special copper alloys are still imported, because we don’t have technology to produce them locally for e.g. Beryllium copper
  • Mining & smelting technology is obsolete Causes substantial air pollution because of sulphur dioxide emission
  • Still don’t have technology for downstream copper products e.g. copper tubes for refrigeration/AC etc. majority of them still imported.
  • Still don’t have technology for complete recovery of precious metals such as Cobalt, Nickel etc from copper concentration.
  • Producing 1 ton Copper from ore takes almost 14000 kwh energy, but producing 1 ton copper from scrap/recycling takes only 1700 kwh.
  • However, scrap based copper smelter are not yet well established in India
  • Very few plants using scrap metal to recycle copper (e.g. Lonavala, Hyderabad)
  • Manpower requirement per tonne of finished copper is very high compared to developed countries due to less automation.
  • There is huge gap between demand and supply, almost 70% copper is imported.
  • There is no smelter at Malanjkhand (MP) hence the concentrate has to be transported to Khetri (Rajasthan) cost of production increases
  • Overall, Indian copper ore is average quality, hence mining/refining is a costly because copper yield is low

Lead and Zinc Industry

Lead and Zinc

  • Ore concentrate (Smelting) Refining (Electrolysis)
  • Runs on the principle that certain minerals have an affinity for certain oils
  • Hence the ore is mixed with water, oil and chemicals
  • The mineral particles get attach with oil bubbles and float on the surface, foam (containing mineral particles) is skimmed off

Location Factors

  • Concentration stage involves significant weight loss carried out near mining site.
  • Refining stage require lot of electricity done near large thermal plants /hydroelectric sites.
  • India doesn’t have sufficient ores of Lead/Zinc, so majority of requirement met via imports.
State Ore Smelter
Jharkhand Lead At Tundoo
Andhra Pradesh Lead Vishakhapatnam, based on imported lead concentrates
Rajasthan Zinc
  • At Debari Ore comes from Rajpur-Dariba mines + via. import
  • At Chanderia Ore comes from Bhilwara
Kerala Zinc Based on imported zinc concentrates
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