Min­er­al resources of the Rivne region of Ukraine, as an impor­tant com­po­nent of the min­ing indus­try, play a key role in the devel­op­ment of the region and in ensur­ing its eco­nom­ic sta­bil­i­ty. More than 600 deposits of 18 types of min­er­al resources have been explored in the Rivne region. Cur­rent­ly, 115 deposits are under exploita­tion.

Peat

Among the fuel and ener­gy min­er­al resources of the region, peat occu­pies a lead­ing posi­tion, with total reserves esti­mat­ed at approx­i­mate­ly 180 mil­lion tons. The main deposits are asso­ci­at­ed with low­land bogs and are con­cen­trat­ed in the north­ern part of the region, where the major deposits include Morochne, Dub­ni­aky, and Kreminne. Small­er peat deposits occur with­in the Male Polis­sia area, includ­ing Ver­ba, Maid­an, Stup­ne, and oth­ers. Small peat­lands are also devel­oped with­in the for­est-steppe part of the region, where they occur exclu­sive­ly in riv­er flood­plains and the thick­ness of peat lay­ers usu­al­ly does not exceed 1.5–2.5 m. Peat resources of the Rivne region are con­sid­ered to be of rel­a­tive­ly high qual­i­ty, with ash con­tent gen­er­al­ly rang­ing from 5% to 28%.

Sapropel

In the region, explored sapro­pel reserves clas­si­fied under cat­e­gories A + C₂ amount to 13,900.0 thou­sand tons, which rep­re­sents 14.3% of the total reserves in Ukraine. Of these, 8,381.3 thou­sand tons are clas­si­fied as bal­ance reserves, account­ing for 60.3% of the explored reserves. Prospect­ing and eval­u­a­tion works were car­ried out on 18 lakes, iden­ti­fy­ing 7,012.8 thou­sand tons of sapro­pel in cat­e­go­ry C₂, of which 2,151.9 thou­sand tons (30.7%) are bal­ance reserves. Detailed explo­ration showed that reserves in cat­e­go­ry A amount to 6,887.2 thou­sand tons, includ­ing 6,229.2 thou­sand tons (90.4%) clas­si­fied as bal­ance reserves. Fore­cast resources of sapro­pel total­ing 1,231.0 thou­sand tons were iden­ti­fied in 13 lakes.

The largest num­ber of deposits is in Zarich­nyan dis­trict, where 7,672,200 tons of sapro­pel (55.2% of the total reserves of the region) were found under cat­e­go­ry A+C₂. Reserves exceed 1 mil­lion tons in Volodymyret­skyi, Dubrovyt­skyi and Kostopil­skyi dis­tricts. The clas­to­genic types of sapro­pel, rep­re­sent­ed by organo-min­er­al (1,732.4 thou­sand tons), organo-clay (1,940.7 thou­sand tons) and diatom-clay (61.5 thou­sand tons), make up 46.3% of the total reserves of the region. Such sapro­pels are usu­al­ly locat­ed in pro­fun­dal zones and cov­ered by oth­er sed­i­ments.

The largest sapro­pel deposits, with reserves exceed­ing 300,000 tons, are locat­ed in the lakes Velike Druge (308,000 tons), Luko (513,000 tons), Ostrovatske (577,000 tons), Verkhne (792,400 tons), Nobel (4,308,000 tons), Maryanivske (1,218,200 tons) and oth­ers. The chem­i­cal com­po­si­tion of sapro­pel deter­mines its suit­abil­i­ty for var­i­ous uses, in par­tic­u­lar in agri­cul­ture, vet­eri­nary med­i­cine, cos­me­tol­ogy and geol­o­gy.

Copper

The Voly­no-Podil­lian Plate, on which part of the Rivne region is locat­ed, is cur­rent­ly con­sid­ered high­ly prospec­tive for the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of indus­tri­al cop­per deposits. With­in its lim­its, four ore nodes are dis­tin­guished: Rat­nen­sky, Rafalivsky, Kukhot­sko­vol­sky, and Shep­etivsky. It is the Rafalivsky node that is exposed with­in the ter­ri­to­ry of the region.

With­in the Rafalivsky ore node, native cop­per min­er­al­iza­tion is exposed by a quar­ry near Rafaliv­ka sta­tion, as well as by a num­ber of bore­holes. It is asso­ci­at­ed with basalts and lava brec­cias of the Rat­nen­s­ka for­ma­tion. In the lat­ter, cop­per forms large native nuggets that were pre­vi­ous­ly found, prob­a­bly in the same hori­zon near the vil­lage of Velykyi Myd­sk. In basalt, cop­per occurs as dis­sem­i­na­tions in amyg­daloids, along frac­tures, in the form of large den­drites, and also in vein­lets with zeo­lites, chlo­rite, chal­cedony, quartz, wairakite, and anal­cime. Cop­per con­tent in basalts is 0.2–0.7%, in lava brec­cias it reach­es up to 5%.

Also with­in the Rafalivsky node, at depths of 10–250 m, ores with cop­per con­tent from 0.1 to 25%, gold up to 1.15 g/t, sil­ver up to 20 g/t, and plat­inum-group ele­ments up to 1.66 g/t have been iden­ti­fied. The thick­ness of ore inter­sec­tions ranges from 0.3–4.5 m. Cop­per min­er­al­iza­tion has been exposed by quar­ry and bore­holes over an area of 32 km². In the low­er bench of the quar­ry, an ore body asso­ci­at­ed with tuff brec­cias is exposed, with cop­per con­tent of 1–3%, some­times up to 6%. Native cop­per fills cav­i­ties in tuffs and tuff brec­cias, form­ing nuggets weigh­ing up to 1 kg. Analcime–chlorite–quartz vein­lets 8–10 cm thick occur here, which in their cen­tral parts con­tain native cop­per. The vein­lets are asso­ci­at­ed with a tec­ton­ic zone of north­west­ern strike. Cop­per min­er­al­iza­tion with­in it has been traced for 4.5 km. Fore­cast resources of cop­per in the Rafaliv­ka area are esti­mat­ed at 3 mil­lion tons, gold at 79 tons, plat­inum and pal­la­di­um at 40 tons, and sil­ver at 1,592 tons.

Granite and granodiorite

The ter­ri­to­ry of the Rivne region includes 139 deposits, of which 69 are cur­rent­ly being exploit­ed. As build­ing stone, intru­sive and effu­sive rocks are wide­ly used: gran­ites, gra­n­odi­or­ites, basalts, etc. Crushed stone (rub­ble and aggre­gate) is used in the region main­ly as a con­crete aggre­gate, while road aggre­gate is used for the con­struc­tion of foun­da­tions and build­ings.

The Kle­siv deposits of gran­ites, gra­n­odi­or­ites, and dior­ites are locat­ed near Kle­siv rail­way sta­tion (Sarny dis­trict, Rivne region). Along the Sarny–Korosten rail­way line, about two dozen large quar­ries are oper­at­ing (or have already been exhaust­ed), includ­ing Tomash­horod, Vyrov, Cha­bel, Rokytne, and oth­ers, which exploit gran­ites, gra­n­odi­or­ites, dior­ites, and gab­bro of the Osnyt­sia com­plex (Pale­o­pro­tero­zoic, ~2000 Ma) and metavol­can­ites of the Kle­siv series.

Gran­ites and gra­n­odi­or­ites pre­dom­i­nate, rep­re­sent­ed by dark grey, grey, or pink medi­um-grained mas­sive rocks with veins of pink fine-grained aplitic, and less com­mon­ly aplite–pegmatite gran­ites, with xeno­liths of var­i­ous sizes of gab­bro, dior­ite, and oth­er rocks. The thick­ness of the over­bur­den (Qua­ter­nary sandy–clayey deposits and weath­ered gran­ites) does not exceed 10 m, and is more com­mon­ly up to 5 m. Water inflow into quar­ries is 10–60 m³ per day. Explored reserves of build­ing mate­ri­als ensure fur­ther devel­op­ment of pro­duc­tion of crushed stone, fac­ing slabs, cement, lime, sil­i­cate and ceram­ic bricks, and con­struc­tion mor­tars, among oth­er mate­ri­als.

Basalt

Unique in Ukraine are the Rivne basalts, which extend in a belt (up to 10–15 km wide) from Slavu­ta to Kuznetsovsk, form­ing sev­en basalt deposits, of which five are cur­rent­ly being devel­oped, includ­ing: Berestovetske, Ivano-Dolynske, and Velykymytske in the Kostopil dis­trict, and Rafalivske and Politske in the Volodymyrets dis­trict. The phe­nom­e­non of basalt columns in Rivne region is explained by the fact that the extrac­tion of basalt raw mate­ri­als is lim­it­ed to deposits in this region; there­fore, with­in Ukraine they are unique. Mas­sive basalt cov­ers in the form of columns (traps) are found in the ter­ri­to­ry of Rivne and Volyn regions. They lie beneath a 20–50 m lay­er of sed­i­men­ta­ry rocks, and only in the quar­ries of Rivne region do basalts reach the sur­face, which deter­mines their active extrac­tion.

Chalk

In the region, chalk domes and water­shed ridges alter­nate with deep depres­sions (this pat­tern is clear­ly observed in the Sluch–Horyn inter­fluve). Karst relief is also asso­ci­at­ed with chalk deposits, rep­re­sent­ed by var­i­ous sink­holes, depres­sions, fun­nels, and glacial lakes (for exam­ple, Lake Bile in Volodymyrets dis­trict).

Extrac­tion is con­cen­trat­ed at the Tor­govytske chalk deposit, which is char­ac­ter­ized by envi­ron­men­tal puri­ty and a high cal­ci­um con­tent in the raw mate­r­i­al. The chalk con­tains 98.5–99.39% cal­ci­um car­bon­ate and has vir­tu­al­ly no impu­ri­ties. Processed chalk can be used in the paint and var­nish indus­try, poly­mer pro­duc­tion, dry con­struc­tion mix­tures, agri­cul­ture (for lim­ing acidic soils), live­stock and poul­try feed sup­ple­men­ta­tion, and com­pound feed pro­duc­tion.

Amber

The Pripy­at amber-bear­ing basin is locat­ed with­in the west­ern and north­ern slopes of the Ukrain­ian Shield (USh), in zones where it is bor­dered by sed­i­men­ta­ry sandy–clayey deposits of the Volyn–Podillian Plate and the Pripy­at Trough. With­in its ter­ri­to­ry, two deposits with con­di­tion­al­ly bal­ance­able amber reserves have been explored — Kle­sivske and Vilne.

The Kle­sivske deposit is the first amber deposit in Ukraine to be explored and exploit­ed. Its reserves were approved in 1990. It has been stud­ied in detail and belongs to the most prospec­tive type of ancient buried marine lagoon–delta plac­er deposits. It is locat­ed near the vil­lage of Kle­siv, Dubrovyt­sia dis­trict, in the north­ern part of the Rivne region. The deposit includes sev­er­al sites, two of which are exposed by quar­ries 472 and 43 (Velykyi Puhach).

The amber-bear­ing hori­zon of quar­ry 472 is exposed along a 700 m quar­ry wall and lies hor­i­zon­tal­ly on a reworked weath­er­ing crust of crys­talline rocks, over­lain by white quartz sands of flu­vioglacial ori­gin. The pro­duc­tive hori­zon, with a thick­ness of 2–2.5 m, con­sists of two units — low­er and upper. The amber con­tent in the low­er unit is about 50 g/m³, while in the upper unit it reach­es 300–500 g/m³. It occurs as frag­ments and irreg­u­lar­ly shaped pieces, and rarely as round­ed peb­bles. On a pro­duc­tive area of 200 × 700 m, at least 14 tons of amber may occur. The amber-bear­ing hori­zon of the Velykyi Puhach site is exposed direct­ly above the weath­er­ing crust of crys­talline rocks. It has a total thick­ness of 1–1.5 m and con­sists of three sandy lay­ers. The upper lay­er is the amber-bear­ing one (15–20 cm). It is com­posed of fine-grained quartz sand of brown­ish col­or with dark brown to black patch­es enriched in humic mate­r­i­al. It con­tains large round­ed amber peb­bles weigh­ing up to 400–600 g.

The Vilne amber deposit is locat­ed 40 km north­west of the Kle­sivske deposit, in the mar­gin­al zone of the north­west­ern slope of the Ukrain­ian Shield, where it is over­lain by sed­i­men­ta­ry for­ma­tions of the Volyn–Podillian Plate and the Pripy­at Basin. The most pro­duc­tive amber-bear­ing stra­ta belong to the Mezhy­hirya For­ma­tion (Oligocene). The Mezhy­hirya For­ma­tion in this area is rep­re­sent­ed by green­ish and grey­ish, poor­ly sort­ed sands with interbeds of clay. The sands con­tain a sig­nif­i­cant amount of humic mate­r­i­al. Amber is main­ly asso­ci­at­ed with clay inter­lay­ers, humic zones, accu­mu­la­tions of chert, frag­ments of grey quartz, and the con­tact zone with the Kyiv For­ma­tion sands. The aver­age thick­ness of pro­duc­tive lay­ers is about 0.7 m, with amber con­tent rang­ing from 1–2 g/m³ to 650 g/m³.

Groundwater

The Rivne region con­tains sig­nif­i­cant reserves of both fresh and min­er­al ground­wa­ter. When cal­cu­lat­ed per capi­ta, this indi­ca­tor exceeds the aver­age for Ukraine by two and a half times. The total fore­cast resources of ground­wa­ter (both fresh and min­er­al) in the region amount to approx­i­mate­ly 5.6 mil­lion m³/day. Of these reserves, only 429.3 thou­sand m³/day are clas­si­fied as exploitable reserves of drink­ing ground­wa­ter, and only 73 thou­sand m³/day are cur­rent­ly in use, indi­cat­ing sig­nif­i­cant poten­tial for the devel­op­ment of the extrac­tion indus­try.

Min­er­al waters include six deposits, of which four are cur­rent­ly being exploit­ed. The total reserves of min­er­al waters amount to 1,736 m³/day. The most wide­spread are chloride–sodium drink­ing waters of the Myrhorod type, with reserves stud­ied in the vil­lages of Zho­bryn and Olek­san­dri­ia, as well as in Stepan and the city of Ostroh. At three deposits (Zho­bryn, Stepan, and Ostroh), pro­duc­tion and indus­tri­al bot­tling of ther­a­peu­tic-table waters is car­ried out. Radon-con­tain­ing min­er­al waters have been iden­ti­fied near the vil­lages of Viry and Marynin. The bal­ne­o­log­i­cal prop­er­ties of these waters, com­bined with rel­a­tive­ly low extrac­tion costs, form the basis for fur­ther devel­op­ment of this sec­tor.

Thus, the Rivne region of Ukraine has sig­nif­i­cant nat­ur­al resource poten­tial. The min­er­al deposits of the region rep­re­sent an inte­gral part of the eco­nom­ic land­scape, con­tribut­ing to its devel­op­ment and pros­per­i­ty. They are a source of valu­able raw mate­ri­als nec­es­sary for mod­ern indus­try and stim­u­late inno­v­a­tive approach­es to the extrac­tion and pro­cess­ing of min­er­al resources. The exploita­tion and explo­ration of deposits in the region indi­cate oppor­tu­ni­ties for the devel­op­ment of con­struc­tion mate­ri­als, ener­gy pro­duc­tion, met­al extrac­tion, and pre­cious min­er­als.