Minerals and Mining – South Africa

What is a renewable resource? List South Africa’s most important mineral resources and their uses (8)
When a resources can be replaced by the same resource (e.g. Water).
1. Gold – Malleable mineral. Gold is used jewellery, dentisty and coins. Gold bars are called
What is a non-renewable resource? ingots.
When a resources cannot be replaced by the same resource (e.g. gold).
2. Platinum – Very rare. Used mainly the car industry (converters in exhausts to reduce toxins
What are minerals? in the exhaust fumes, jewellery and electronics (PC disc drives).
Solid substance that one finds naturally in the earth (e.g. gold ore).
3. Diamond – Very strong mineral. Used in special cutting wheels, medical diamond knives,
What is ore? special drill bits and jewellery. SA is a leading producer.
Rock in the ground containing the metal – iron ore, copper ore
4. Iron ore – Very strong mineral. Used to make steel, transport industry (trains, ships and
What are mineral resources? cars), building construction (iron rods to reinforce bridges and buildings), machinery.
Mineral is a solid substance found naturally in the earth, we need these minerals to work
and live (resource). Examples are: gold, copper, platinum. 5. Chrome – mixed with steel to make stainless steel that can’t rust. Stainless steel used to
make cutlery/pots/pans, medical industry. Chrome makes other metals shiny.
Name a few non-renewable mineral resources.
Gold, platinum, iron, copper, silver (once it’s gone, it’s gone!) 6. Copper – ductile mineral. Used in electrical wires, water pipes, jewellery, coins.

Are all mineral resources non-renewable? 7. Silver – malleable. Used for jewellery and trophies.
Yes. Once it’s gone, it’s gone!
8. Manganese – Mixed with steel to make it stronger. Used to make batteries and tools.
South Africa is the largest producer of 2 mineral resources. Name them.
Platinum – 88% of the world’s total
Chrome – 72% of the world’s total

What about gold?

SA is the 11th largest producer of gold – 3% of the world’s total (China is the largest at 11%)

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 Minerals and Mining – South Africa

Coal Mining and Settlement

What is coal? What is a settlement?
Rock made from remains op plants that died millions of years ago. (remains – what’s left A new town that starts to develop around a place of industry. For example:
over)
• Kimberly: The first diamond was discovered on a farm near Kimberly (1866). The town
How does coal differ from other mineral resources? Kimberly developed because of the diamond mine.
Coal is organic formed by remains of plants; it is not found in rocks like metals. (organic –
living matter) • Johannesburg: Gold was first discovered closed to Johannesburg (1886). The city
Johannesburg developed because of the gold mining. It was the largest gold mining region in
How was coal formed? the world at one stage. Gauteng means Place of Gold in Sesotho. Other towns around
• Formed around 300 million years ago in hot and humid regions with swamps. Johannesburg that started as a result of gold mining: Benoni, Brakpan, Springs, Roodepoort.
• Some trees that died fell into the swamps.
• Free State: Gold was discovered in this region which started towns Klerksdorp, Welkom,
• Swamps filled up with layers of trees. Kroonstad.
• Rivers washed sediment (sand and mud) into the swamps. The sediment buried the
trees. • KwaZulu - Natal and Mpumalanga: Coal was discovered in these regions which started
• Layers of sediment crushed and compacted the trees. towns Vryheid, Newcastle, Witbank.
• The trees became fossilised into a seam of coal (seam – layer of coal).

Why is coal non-renewable?

Coal was made millions of years ago. It cannot be replaced like water.

What is the main use of coal in South Africa?

Electricity. SA’s uses coal power stations to generate electricity for the country.
Medupi in Limpopo is the largest coal power station in SA.

Name a few other uses of coal.

Coal is used to for heating and to make petrol, plastics, tar and paper.

What type of gas can be found in a coal mine.

Methane gas which is highly toxic and odourless. In the olden days miners took little birds
(canaries) down the mine with them. If the bird died they knew that there was methane gas
and left the mine immediately.

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 Minerals and Mining – South Africa

Open pit and shaft mining What are the advantages and disadvantages shaft mining?
What is mining? Advantages
Digging out rocks (ore) that contain minerals. • They can reach rock very deep underground.
• It’s less damaging to the surfaces’ soil and rock.
How are the minerals removed from the ore?
Rocks are crushed into a fine powder and the mineral is removed via chemical process. Disadvantages
The crushed rock that isn’t used is called mining waste which can be very toxic. • Waste (rock and soil) is brought up from underground which needs to be dumped
somewhere.
Name 2 types of mining? Explain what they are. • Chemicals - often the waste contains poisonous chemicals that can pollute the water and
• Open pit mining: a big hole is dug at the surface to remove the ore. surround areas.
• Sinkholes – big spaces underground can make the surface unstable. The surface can
• Shaft mining: deep-level mining. The mine goes down very far underground to get to collapse and cause big dangerous sinkholes.
the minerals. The mine has a shaft and many tunnels underground. Miners blast
tunnels with dynamite and use drills to get the minerals out. Miners are taken down the Give an example of a shaft mine in South Africa.
shaft to get to the rocks underground. • Gold mine: Mponeng (Gauteng) – deepest mine in the world – 4km deep
• Gold mine: TauTona (Gauteng) – 3,9km deep
What are the advantages and disadvantages of open pit mining?
Advantages
• Simplest form of mining if minerals are near the surface.
• Big trucks can drive in to remove large volume of rock.
• Big opening, easy to take equipment down.

Disadvantages
• The deeper one needs to dig the more expensive and difficult it becomes to move the
rock.
• Very damaging to the environment – it can create erosion (removal of all the soil and
rock). The chemicals used to extract the minerals from the ore can poison the
underground water.

Give an example of an open pit mine in South Africa.

• Diamond mine (Kimberly) – the hole was ± 214m deep before mining stopped. They
mined around 3 tonnes of diamonds.
• Copper mine (Phalaborwa)– in operation, 800m deep.

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 Minerals and Mining – South Africa
Mining and the environment Mining and the law
What report does a mining company submit to the government before it starts to mine?
Why is mining bad for the environment? Environment impact study – it is a report that shows the impact of the mine on the
The waste material from mining can cause air and water pollution. environment. The mine must also agree to return the environment back to its original state
once the mining is done.
Name the different types of pollution from mining.
Water pollution: waste material contains poisonous chemicals which can pollute rivers Mining and people
and dams when it rains. Deep level mining has many risks for miners, name a few.
• Heat: Shaft mines are very hot (70˚C). They need special aircon units to keep miners cool.
Air pollution: to extract metal from ore, the ore must be crushed into powder which makes • Rock burst: Rock deep underground is under massive pressure (920 times more than
a lot of dust. When the wind blows, dust from the mines blow into homes which can make surface). When miners start moving this rock it can ‘explode’. This can kill many miners (5
people sick. People try to stop this by growing grass/vegetation over the fine powder. miners die for every tonne of platinum mined).
• Fresh air: Blasting rock with dynamite causes poisonous air. This poisonous air must be
Destruction of vegetation and wildlife: Open pit mines destroy vegetation/soil – the replaced with fresh air via special ventilation systems.
wildlife disappears because of that. Deep shaft mines make large tunnels underground
which could collapse. Big trucks used to move the waste destroys plants. What type of illnesses can miners get from mining?
Lung disease called silicosis. Silica is a glassy mineral in ore. When the ore is made into a
Waste: Less than 5% of the ore brought to the surface contains valuable minerals. The powder miners breathe in the silica dust which damages their lungs, and they die.
other 95% of the ore is waste. Asbestos: SA used to have asbestos mines – miners breathed in the asbestos fibres which
Ore is mixed with water and chemicals to extract the minerals. This leaves ‘waste mud’ damaged their lungs and killed them. Asbestos has been banned worldwide.
which is very poisonous. Another name for waste mud is ‘tailings’.
Are there laws to protect miners?
Yes. By law, mining companies must have certain safety standards for miners. Inspectors
How do miners dispose of waste material (tailings).
inspect the mines on a regular basis. The mining company is fined for not following the safety
Special waste dams are built to store the tailings. standards. As a result, fewer miners die each year.

Which organisation check that the waste dams are built correctly?
SABS – South African Bureau of Standards

What are the consequences if a waste dam isn’t built correctly and gets a crack?
• Mudflows with poisonous waste can cover towns.
• Chemicals from the waste cans poison plants and animals. 61
• Chemicals from the waste can poison the soil and water – nothing will grow.
 Shaft mine underground Rock burst
Kimberly open pit diamond mine

Shaft mine diagram

Phalaborwa open pit copper mine

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Mining settlement in Johannesburg Waste dam

Rehabilitated mine dump

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