The extrac­tion of min­er­al resources in Donet­sk region cov­ers a wide range of nat­ur­al raw mate­ri­als. Around 850 deposits have been iden­ti­fied in the region, where approx­i­mate­ly 50 types of min­er­al resources are cur­rent­ly devel­oped and uti­lized. The oblast con­tains sig­nif­i­cant reserves of hard coal, antimony–mercury ores, dolomite, lime­stone, marls, rock salt, nepheline syen­ites, refrac­to­ry clays, and oth­er min­er­als. A key fea­ture of the region’s min­er­al base is the con­ve­nient spa­tial com­bi­na­tion of deposits and a high lev­el of indus­tri­al devel­op­ment.

Hard coal

Coal deposits in Ukraine are con­cen­trat­ed in the south­east­ern part of the coun­try. With­in the Donets Basin, coal-bear­ing areas cov­er more than 60,000 km² (the Great Don­bas). About 92% of Ukraine’s hard coal reserves are con­cen­trat­ed here. The main coal min­ing cen­ters include the cities of Donet­sk, Maki­iv­ka, Yenaki­ieve, Toret­sk, and Pokrovsk, among oth­ers. The region con­tains 163 mines with total pro­duc­tion capac­i­ties exceed­ing 43.9 mil­lion tons per year, while bal­ance reserves amount to approx­i­mate­ly 5,118.4 mil­lion tons. The depth of coal seam exploita­tion ranges from 12 to 1,300 meters (with an aver­age depth of about 595 meters).

Asso­ci­at­ed min­er­als in coal deposits include methane gas and ger­ma­ni­um. Accord­ing to var­i­ous expert esti­mates, total methane resources in Donet­sk region exceed 100 tril­lion m³. Hard coal remains a key strate­gic ener­gy resource, with reserves suf­fi­cient to sup­port long-term nation­al ener­gy needs.

Antimony–mercury ores of Donetsk region

The antimony–mercury ore deposits in Donet­sk region belong to the Donet­sk mer­cury met­al­lo­genic province, which includes the Donet­sk fold­ed region and the adja­cent south­east­ern mar­gin of the Dnipro–Donets Depres­sion. This region hosts some of the largest mer­cury deposits, some­times with sig­nif­i­cant anti­mo­ny con­tent, includ­ing the promi­nent Myky­tiv­ka mer­cury ore field.

The Myky­tiv­ka mer­cury ore field, dis­cov­ered in 1879, is one of the largest in the world in terms of mer­cury reserves. Its indus­tri­al reserves reach approx­i­mate­ly 25,000 tons of mer­cury. Addi­tion­al­ly, about 5,000 tons are con­tained in low-grade ores, while fore­cast resources (cat­e­gories P₁+P₂) are esti­mat­ed at around 2,000 tons. The ore field includes sev­er­al deposits, such as Zal­iz­ni­anske, Michurinske, Katushkine, Sofi­ivske, Chornokurhanche, and Cha­harnytske, among oth­ers.

Mer­cury and anti­mo­ny act as typo­mor­phic ele­ments in gold–sulfide ore for­ma­tions, where two main min­er­al types are dis­tin­guished: gold–cinnabar and gold–sulfosalt–sulfide. Deposits of this for­ma­tion type can serve as a source of anti­mo­ny and mer­cury when the pri­ma­ry min­er­al­iza­tion is extract­ed. An exam­ple of the gold–pyrite type is the Mykhailiv­ka ore occur­rence, asso­ci­at­ed with the core of the Olkho­vats­ka anti­cline near its north­west­ern per­i­cli­nal clo­sure.

The gold–sulfosalt–sulfide type is char­ac­ter­ized by high anti­mo­ny con­tent and ele­vat­ed mer­cury con­cen­tra­tions. Salt-dome mercury–bitumen deposits are found in the north­west­ern Don­bas with­in the Samara–Toretsk met­al­lo­genic dis­trict, which includes the Slo­vian­sk mer­cury deposit.

A sig­nif­i­cant fea­ture of the Don­bas region is mer­cury-bear­ing coal. The total area of coal deposits with dis­persed mer­cury min­er­al­iza­tion exceeds 100 km², of which only about 20% is asso­ci­at­ed with endoge­nous mer­cury halos around deposits and ore occur­rences.

Dolomite

In Donet­sk region, three dolomite deposits and two account­ing objects have been devel­oped. The main reserves and all indus­tri­al pro­duc­tion of dolomite for met­al­lur­gi­cal use are con­cen­trat­ed in the South­ern Don­bas region. Dolomites form part of the Low­er Car­bonif­er­ous car­bon­ate sequence, with a thick­ness of approx­i­mate­ly 300–450 m. This for­ma­tion extends in a sub­lat­i­tu­di­nal direc­tion for about 50 km, run­ning par­al­lel to the junc­tion zone between the Don­bas fold­ed region and the Azov part of the Ukrain­ian Shield.

With­in the Vol­no­vas­ka zone are the Novotroitske, Olenivske, Stilske, Karakub­ske, Sev­er­no­shevchenkivske deposits, as well as promis­ing objects (Per­shotravnevy, Rod­nikivskyi). In this area, car­bon­ate rocks are rep­re­sent­ed by flux lime­stones, dolomi­tized lime­stones, and dolomites. How­ev­er, due to the devel­op­ment of karst process­es at deep­er hori­zons along the dip of the stra­ta, the qual­i­ty of raw mate­r­i­al tends to dete­ri­o­rate.

Marl

The Amvrosi­ivske (main) marl deposit is locat­ed in the Amvrosi­iv­ka dis­trict of Donet­sk region. The pro­duc­tive lay­er con­sists of marls of the Cam­pan­ian stage of the Upper Cre­ta­ceous, occur­ring as a bed­ded deposit. The marls are grey, dense, and mas­sive in the pro­duc­tive zone. In the weath­er­ing zone, which is 30–40 m thick, the rocks become grey­ish-white, local­ly loose and frac­tured.

The thick­ness of the marls is watered. Due to uneven frac­tur­ing, water sat­u­ra­tion varies sig­nif­i­cant­ly both across the area and with depth. The ground­wa­ter lev­el decreas­es toward the gul­ly zones, where the marl lay­er is most water-sat­u­rat­ed. Bore­holes drilled in the thal­weg of the gul­ly yield max­i­mum dis­charge (about 6–8 L/s), while wells locat­ed on inter­fluves are prac­ti­cal­ly dry.

The Karpivske deposit of marls and chalk is also locat­ed in the Amvrosi­iv­ka dis­trict of Donet­sk region. The over­bur­den con­sists of loose sandy–clayey sed­i­ments and semi-rock marl lay­ers. The thick­ness of the over­bur­den varies from 0.4 to 36.6 m.

Rare metals

World­wide, com­plex­es of Pro­tero­zoic and Pale­o­zoic alka­line rock series are a major source of meta­so­mat­ic rare-met­al deposits. In Ukraine, the most sig­nif­i­cant area in terms of alumina–rare met­al poten­tial is the alka­line com­plex­es of the Oktiabrsky mas­sif in the Azov region. With­in this mas­sif, spe­cif­ic zones of nepheline-bear­ing and rare-met­al-bear­ing rocks have been iden­ti­fied, form­ing deposits of com­plex ores. Three deposits are dis­tin­guished in the mas­sif: Mazurivske, Kalinino–Shevchenkivske, and Vali-Tara­ma.

The Mazurivske deposit con­sists of gen­tly dip­ping ore bod­ies rep­re­sent­ed by six vein-like bod­ies of nepheline rocks, sep­a­rat­ed by bar­ren blocks of basic and ultra­ba­sic com­po­si­tion. The mor­phol­o­gy of the ore bod­ies is com­plex: they split, form new lens­es, and then rejoin. The aver­age thick­ness of indi­vid­ual ore bod­ies is 17–30 m. This deposit is the most pre­pared for indus­tri­al exploita­tion; it has con­firmed reserves, is part­ly exposed by an open pit, and is locat­ed near the Donet­sk chem­i­cal-met­al­lur­gi­cal plant. Near­by deposits of lime­stone and kaolin, required for pro­cess­ing syen­ites, are also present.

The Kalinino–Shevchenkivske deposit is com­posed of basic rocks, alka­line syen­ites, and a com­plex of nepheline-bear­ing rocks, includ­ing nephelin­ized syen­ites and mar­i­upo­lites. The deposit con­tains ore and post-ore frac­ture sys­tems. Nepheline ore veins devel­oped along ore-con­trol­ling fault sys­tems. In min­er­al and chem­i­cal com­po­si­tion, the ores are sim­i­lar to those of the Mazurivske deposit.

West of the Kalinino–Shevchenkivske deposit lies the Vali-Tara­ma area, com­posed of foy­aites, alka­line syen­ites, and mar­i­upo­lites. Indi­vid­ual steeply dip­ping veins of nepheline ores reach the sur­face. The area has been only weak­ly explored to a depth of 200 m, reserves have not yet been cal­cu­lat­ed, but a sig­nif­i­cant increase in pre­dict­ed nepheline ore resources is expect­ed.

Refractory clays

Refrac­to­ry clays in the Donet­sk region are char­ac­ter­ized by high-qual­i­ty raw mate­r­i­al. The Cha­siv Yar deposit is unique in scale and qual­i­ty, locat­ed near the town of Cha­siv Yar over an area of up to 25 km². The clays main­ly belong to six grades and are dis­tin­guished by high plas­tic­i­ty and bind­ing prop­er­ties. They con­tain a low amount of col­or­ing oxides and have a sin­ter­ing tem­per­a­ture of 1580–1730°C. The reserves of the deposit in the unde­vel­oped area are about 40 mil­lion tons. There is no expect­ed increase in reserves. The deposit is cur­rent­ly being devel­oped by five min­ing oper­a­tions.

Groundwater

With­in the Donet­sk region, there are 54 deposits com­pris­ing 116 sites of fresh­wa­ter, tech­ni­cal, and drainage ground­wa­ter. Sig­nif­i­cant reserves are found in the Torske and Yampilske sites of the Kamyshi­v­atske deposit of nat­ur­al min­er­al table water, locat­ed with­in the Lyman dis­trict of the Donet­sk region.

In gen­er­al, ground­wa­ter is asso­ci­at­ed with Qua­ter­nary, Cre­ta­ceous, Juras­sic, and Tri­as­sic for­ma­tions. Chem­i­cal­ly, the water is sulfate–hydrocarbonate sodi­um type. The min­er­al water is nat­u­ral­ly potable table water with­out spe­cif­ic com­po­nents or prop­er­ties and can be used as bot­tled drink­ing water for indus­tri­al dis­tri­b­u­tion.

In con­clu­sion, the arti­cle high­lights the impor­tance of min­er­al resources as a key fac­tor in the eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment of the Donet­sk region. At the same time, it rais­es issues relat­ed to ter­ri­to­r­i­al loss and con­flict, which require urgent res­o­lu­tion to ensure region­al sta­bil­i­ty. Restor­ing ter­ri­to­r­i­al integri­ty would open new prospects for eco­nom­ic growth and improve the qual­i­ty of life of the local pop­u­la­tion.