The Mesabi Iron Range is a mining district in northeastern Minnesota following an elongate trend containing large deposits of iron ore. It is the largest of four major iron ranges in the region collectively known as the Iron Range of Minnesota. First described in 1866, it is the chief iron ore mining district in the United States. The district is located largely in Itasca and Saint Louis counties. It has been extensively worked since 1892, and has seen a transition from high-grade direct shipping ores through gravity concentrates to the current industry exclusively producing iron ore (taconite) pellets. Production has been dominantly controlled by vertically integrated steelmakers since 1901, and therefore is dictated largely by US ironmaking capacity and demand.
Codelco is a Chilean state owned copper mining company. It was formed in 1976 from foreign-owned copper companies that were nationalised in 1971.
Rossland is in the West Kootenay region of south central British Columbia. High in the Monashee Mountains, the city lies immediately east of the intersections of BC highways 3B and 22. The facilities provide a winter base for the nearby multi-peak ski hills of the Red Mountain Resort. In the non winter months Rossland turns into a primarily a mountain bike town, with golf and fishing options nearby as well.
Anyox was a small company-owned mining town in British Columbia, Canada. Today it is a ghost town, abandoned and largely destroyed. It is located on the shores of Granby Bay in coastal Observatory Inlet, about 60 kilometres southeast of Stewart, British Columbia, and about 20 kilometres, across wilderness, east of the tip of the Alaska Panhandle.
The Sullivan Mine is a now-closed conventional–mechanized underground mine located in Kimberley, British Columbia, Canada. The ore body is a complex, sediment-hosted, sedimentary exhalative deposit consisting primarily of zinc, lead, and iron sulphides. Lead, zinc, silver and tin were the economic metals produced. The deposit lies within the lower part of the Purcell Supergroup and mineralization occurred about 1470 million years ago during the late Precambrian (Mesoproterozoic).
KGHM Polska Miedź S.A., commonly known as KGHM, is a Polish multinational corporation that employs around 34,000 people around the world and has been a major copper and silver producer for more than 50 years. In 1991, the company was established as a state enterprise and since 1997, their shares have been traded on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Currently, KGHM operates 9 open-pit and underground mines located in Poland, Canada, the USA and Chile and is actively advancing 4 projects. KGHM produces key global resources including copper, copper sulphate, gold, silver, nickel, nickel sulphate, molybdenum, rhenium, lead, sulphuric acid, selenium, platinum group metals. KGHM is based in Lower Silesian Voivodeship in Lubin, Poland.
The Bingham Canyon Mine, more commonly known as Kennecott Copper Mine among locals, is an open-pit mining operation extracting a large porphyry copper deposit southwest of Salt Lake City, Utah, in the Oquirrh Mountains. The mine is the largest man-made excavation, and deepest open-pit mine in the world, which is considered to have produced more copper than any other mine in history – more than 19 million tons. The mine is owned by Rio Tinto Group, a British-Australian multinational corporation. The copper operations at Bingham Canyon Mine are managed through Kennecott Utah Copper Corporation which operates the mine, a concentrator plant, a smelter, and a refinery. The mine has been in production since 1906, and has resulted in the creation of a pit over 0.75 miles (1,210 m) deep, 2.5 miles (4 km) wide, and covering 1,900 acres. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1966 under the name Bingham Canyon Open Pit Copper Mine. The mine experienced a massive landslide in April 2013 and a smaller slide in September 2013.
Mount Isa Mines Limited ("MIM") operates the Mount Isa copper, lead, zinc and silver mines near Mount Isa, Queensland, Australia as part of the Glencore group of companies. For a brief period in 1980, MIM was Australia's largest company. It has pioneered several significant mining industry innovations, including the Isa Process copper refining technology, the Isasmelt smelting technology, and the IsaMill fine grinding technology, and it also commercialized the Jameson Cell column flotation technology.
Heath Steele Mines, situated 60 km (37 mi) northwest of Newcastle, New Brunswick, Canada, at the headwaters of the Tomogonops and Little Rivers, was a large and productive copper, lead and zinc mine which operated from 1956 to 1999. The mine was an economic cornerstone of Miramichi communities throughout this period.
The Mining industry of Ghana accounts for 5% of the country's GDP and minerals make up 37% of total exports, of which gold contributes over 90% of the total mineral exports. Thus, the main focus of Ghana's mining and minerals development industry remains focused on gold. Ghana is Africa's largest gold producer, producing 80.5 t in 2008. Ghana is also a major producer of bauxite, manganese and diamonds. Ghana has 20 large-scale mining companies producing gold, diamonds, bauxite and manganese, and, there are also over 300 registered small scale mining groups and 90 mine support service companies.
The Estella Mine is a former mine site situated near Wasa, British Columbia at an elevation of 6,000 feet (1,800 m) on Tracy Creek.
Phoenix is a ghost town in the Boundary Country of British Columbia, Canada, 11 km east of Greenwood. Once called the “highest city in Canada” by its citizens it was a booming copper mining community from the late 1890s until 1919. In its heyday it was home to 1,000 citizens and had an opera house, twenty hotels, a brewery and its own city hall. Phoenix’s magistrate, Judge Willie Williams, who served there from 1897 until 1913, became famous for his booming declaration, “I am the highest judge, in the highest court, in the highest city in Canada.” In 1911, Phoenix’s hockey team won the provincial championship and asked for the right to compete for the Stanley Cup, but it was too late to qualify. The Granby Consolidated Mining, Smelting and Power Company operated the Phoenix Mine, a copper mine that produced 13,678,901 tons of ore before operations ceased on June 14, 1919.
Granby Consolidated Mining, Smelting and Power Co. was established by charter to operate in the Boundary region of southern British Columbia. Primarily involved in the mining and smelting of copper, the conglomerate became a publicly traded company. The various corporate operating names within the former group mostly specified the Granby identity.
Cortez Gold Mine is a large gold mining and processing facility in Lander and Eureka County, Nevada, United States, located approximately 75 miles (120 km) southwest of Elko. It is owned as a joint venture between Barrick Gold Corporation (61.5%) and Newmont Corporation (38.5%), operated by Barrick, and comprises the Pipeline, Crossroads, and Cortez Hills open pit mines; and the Cortez Hills underground mine. Ore from the mines is treated at an oxide mill at the site and on leach pads, while refractory ore is shipped to Barrick’s Goldstrike operation for processing.
Goldstrike is a gold mine in Eureka County in north-eastern Nevada. It is located on the Carlin Trend, a prolific gold mining district. It is owned and operated by Barrick Gold. Since Barrick acquired Goldstrike in 1986, until 2018 it produced 44.4 million ounces of gold.
Thompson Creek Metals Company Inc. was a full cycle mining company with acquisition, exploration, development, and operation in North America. The corporate office was located in Denver, Colorado. The company primarily produced copper, gold, and molybdenum. Over its history, the Company evolved from being a major primary molybdenum producer to becoming a copper and gold mining company with the construction and development of the Mount Milligan mine and concentrator in British Columbia, Canada. Mount Milligan was Thompson Creek Metals principal operation and the company owned 100% of this property. The company also owned 100% of its Thompson Creek Mine in Idaho. Thompson Creek Metals owned 75% joint venture interest in two other properties, including its Endako Mine in British Columbia, and its Langeloth Metallurgical Facility (roaster) in Pennsylvania. Thompson Creek Metals had additional development projects, including the Berg property in British Columbia.
Centres of mining operations include Konkola and Kitwe.
Iron mining in the United States produced 48 million metric tons of iron ore in 2019. Iron ore was the third-highest-value metal mined in the United States, after gold and copper. Iron ore was mined from nine active mines and three reclamation operations in Michigan, Minnesota, and Utah. Most of the iron ore was mined in northern Minnesota's Mesabi Range. Net exports were 3.9 million tons. US iron ore made up 2.5 percent of the total mined worldwide in 2015. Employment as of 2014 was 5,750 in iron mines and iron ore treatment plants.
The Teck Cominco smelter, also known as the Teck Cominco Lead-Zinc Smelter, Cominco Smelter, and Trail smelter located in Trail, British Columbia, Canada, which is owned and operated by Vancouver, British Columbia-based Teck Cominco Metals Ltd—renamed Teck Resources—is the largest integrated lead-zinc smelter of its kind in the world. It is situated approximately 10 miles (16 km) north of the border between British Columbia, Canada and Washington, in the United States, on the Columbia River. Since 1896, there has been a copper and gold smelting operation in the area. The original company, Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company of Canada, was founded in 1906 through a merger of several entities then under the control of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR). In July 2001, Cominco and Tech Resources merged and in 2008, Teck Cominco renamed itself as Teck. By 2018, the Teck Cominco smelter complex had been in operation for over a century. It provided 1,400 jobs in 2018, making it the largest employer in the small city of Trail, with a population of 7800. In 2017, the smelter produced "more than 230,000 tons of zinc, which is used in rustproofing both iron and steel. Teck reported that they had invested CA$525 million in the late 2010s to "improve efficiency and performance at its Trail Operations" and that they intend to invest an added CA$150 million. The Trail Operations contributed only CA$169 million to Teck Resources CA$3.3-billion gross profit in 2017.
Nickel Plate Mine was a gold mine on Nickel Plate Mountain at Hedley in the Similkameen region of southern British Columbia.
