Zapor­izhzhia region con­tains numer­ous min­er­al deposits that play an impor­tant role in the devel­op­ment of the region’s indus­try and econ­o­my. From a tec­ton­ic per­spec­tive, the ter­ri­to­ry of Zapor­izhzhia region belongs to two major geostruc­tur­al blocks. The north­ern part of the region is locat­ed with­in the Prya­zovskyi megablock of the Ukrain­ian Shield, which cor­re­sponds in relief to the Prya­zovs­ka Upland. The south­ern part lies with­in the Black Sea Depres­sion, expressed in the land­scape as the Black Sea Low­land.

This arrange­ment caus­es dif­fer­ences in the spa­tial dis­tri­b­u­tion of min­er­al deposits. The main part of the deposits is con­fined to the north­ern part of the region, where deposits of iron, man­ganese ores, gran­ites, por­phyrites, etc. are devel­oped. This geo­log­i­cal posi­tion con­tributes to the devel­op­ment of the min­ing and met­al­lur­gi­cal indus­try and pro­vides the poten­tial for fur­ther eco­nom­ic growth of the region.

Gas

The Prya­zovske gas field is locat­ed in the Prya­zovskyi dis­trict of Zapor­izhzhia region, 6 km south of the urban-type set­tle­ment Prya­zovske and is bound­ed in the south­east by the coast of the Azov Sea. Struc­tural­ly, the field is con­fined to the Prya­zovskyi megablock of the Ukrain­ian Shield. Gas-bear­ing poten­tial is asso­ci­at­ed with Neo­gene sequences of dark clays with interbeds and lens­es of gray silt­stones, sands, and sand­stones. The gas reser­voirs are litho­log­i­cal­ly con­fined. The min­i­mum depth of the top of pro­duc­tive hori­zons is 88–115 m. Gas-bear­ing lay­ers pinch out toward the south­ern part of the field. The thick­ness of gas-bear­ing inter­vals ranges from 50 to 64 m, with the great­est reser­voir thick­ness observed in the cen­tral part of the field.

Brown coal

In Zapor­izhzhia region, brown coal deposits are con­cen­trat­ed in the north­ern part of the region. These deposits belong to the Dnipro brown coal basin and rep­re­sent its south­ern flank. The Orikhivske deposit is locat­ed west of the town of Orikhiv, while the Sanzharivske deposit is sit­u­at­ed in the north­east­ern part of the Huli­aipole dis­trict. Coal occurs at depths of 25–50 m and has a rel­a­tive­ly high calorif­ic val­ue.

Peat

There are five reg­is­tered peat deposits in the region under the State Com­mis­sion of Ukraine for Min­er­al Reserves. Geo­log­i­cal reserves were esti­mat­ed at 343 thou­sand tonnes. As of 01.01.2018, these deposits are not being exploit­ed.

Iron ores

The Biloz­er­ka iron ore dis­trict is a group of iron ore deposits in Zapor­izhzhia region locat­ed on the south­ern slope of the Ukrain­ian Crys­talline Shield. It was dis­cov­ered by the West­ern Ukrain­ian Geo­log­i­cal Expe­di­tion in 1948. It includes the Piv­den­no-Biloz­er­ka, Pivnich­no-Biloz­er­ka, and Pereverzivske deposits. The ore-bear­ing sequence is rep­re­sent­ed by Archean band­ed iron for­ma­tions (fer­rug­i­nous quartzites) with a thick­ness rang­ing from 60 to 250 m. These for­ma­tions can be traced along strike for sev­er­al kilo­me­ters and down-dip for more than 1,500 m. Min­er­alog­i­cal­ly, the ores are of the hematite–martite type, with an aver­age iron con­tent of about 60.6%.

The Prya­zovske iron ore dis­trict is a group of iron ore deposits locat­ed in Zapor­izhzhia and Donet­sk oblasts. It includes the Mar­i­upol, Kuk­sun­hur, and Orikhiv–Huliaipole ore fields. The ore-bear­ing sequences are com­posed of band­ed iron for­ma­tions of Low­er Pro­tero­zoic and Upper Archean age. Iron con­tent in the ores ranges from 15% to 34%. The Kuk­sun­hur ore field includes the Kuk­sun­hur, Ser­hi­ivske, Kor­satske, Novoukrainske, and Pavlivske deposits. The Orikhiv–Huliaipole ore field includes the Huli­aip­ilske, Vasynivske, and Sev­ery­ot­er­sianske deposits.

Manganese ores

One of the largest man­ganese ore deposits in Ukraine — the Velyko-Tok­mak deposit — is locat­ed in the region. It is part of the Nikopol man­ganese ore basin. The ore bod­ies are asso­ci­at­ed with an Oligocene sed­i­men­ta­ry sequence com­posed of sand–silt–clay deposits lying on a weath­ered crys­talline base­ment. The ore mate­r­i­al occurs in var­i­ous forms: nod­ules, round­ed con­cen­tri­cal­ly lay­ered bod­ies, angu­lar frag­ments, mas­sive lay­ers, and earthy aggre­gates, col­lec­tive­ly occu­py­ing up to 50% of the host sequence. Oxide, oxide–carbonate, and car­bon­ate ores are dis­tin­guished, with car­bon­ate ores being pre­dom­i­nant.

Titanium–zirconium ores

The region con­tains two plac­er dis­tricts of com­plex titanium–zirconium ores with­in the Ukrain­ian plac­er province: the Huli­aipole and Tok­mak dis­tricts. The Huli­aipole dis­trict includes the Novomyko­laiv­ka group of deposits, as well as the Ulian­ivske and Stul­nivske occur­rences. The Tok­mak dis­trict includes the Nohaiske, Berdianske, and Novopetrivske deposits. At present, these deposits are not being exploit­ed.

Gold

The main gold-bear­ing object in Zapor­izhzhia region is the Surozke deposit, locat­ed in the Berdian­sk dis­trict. Gold min­er­al­iza­tion is asso­ci­at­ed with the Sorokyn­s­ka green­stone struc­ture at the inter­sec­tion of north­west- and north­east-trend­ing faults. The ore-bear­ing assem­blage includes band­ed iron for­ma­tions, metabasalts, metako­mati­ites, metarhy­o­dacites, and schists. Ore bod­ies occur as strat­i­form zones of sili­ci­fied and sul­fidized meta­so­matites with­in cat­a­clased and brec­ciat­ed schists, amphi­bo­lites, and mag­netite quartzites. They are con­formable with host rocks and are often con­fined to con­tacts between dif­fer­ent litholo­gies. Gold con­tent in some areas of the deposit reach­es up to 10 g/t.

Molybdenum, tungsten, beryllium

Molyb­de­num min­er­al­iza­tion is known with­in the Cherni­hivskyi, Salty­chan­skyi, and Obitochnyi mas­sifs. The Surozke gold deposit is con­sid­ered prospec­tive for tung­sten min­er­al­iza­tion. Beryl­li­um occur­rences in the region are known at the “Bal­ka Kru­ta” lithi­um peg­matite deposit, as well as with­in the Yel­y­seivske field of ceram­ic peg­matites.

Platinoids, germanium

Ultra­ba­sic rocks of the Obitochna Riv­er basin and the Sorokyn­s­ka zone are char­ac­ter­ized by ele­vat­ed con­cen­tra­tions of plat­inum and plat­inum-group ele­ments (PGE). Occur­rences of ger­ma­ni­um in Zapor­izhzhia region are known with­in the Huli­aipole iron ore deposit.

Rare metals

Zapor­izhzhia region hosts sev­er­al occur­rences of rare met­als. The Novopoltavske apatite rare met­al deposit is locat­ed about 1 km north of the urban-type set­tle­ment of Cherni­hiv­ka, with­in Polo­hy and Berdian­sk dis­tricts. This is a com­plex deposit where the main raw mate­ri­als include: apatite, tan­ta­lum ores, nio­bi­um ores, stron­tium ores, rare earth ele­ment ores, ura­ni­um ores, flu­o­rine, mag­netite con­cen­trate, car­bon­ate raw mate­ri­als.

The “Kru­ta Bal­ka” ore occur­rence is locat­ed in Berdian­sk dis­trict on the right bank of the Ber­da Riv­er. Its main min­er­al resources include tan­ta­lum, nio­bi­um, and lithi­um ores host­ed in peg­matites, as well as cesium‑, rubidium‑, and lithi­um-bear­ing ores occur­ring in micas and altered rocks. Asso­ci­at­ed min­er­als include feldspar, quartz, mus­covite, gra­n­odi­or­ite, vein quartz, and amphi­bo­lite, for which pre­lim­i­nary reserves have been esti­mat­ed.

Graphite

Graphite deposits in the region are con­fined to the Temriutske–Troitske graphite-bear­ing field. This field includes the Tem­ri­utske, Troitske, and Sachkynske deposits, locat­ed along the mid­dle reach­es of the Ber­da Riv­er and in the low­er parts of its trib­u­taries near the vil­lage of Myko­laiv­ka, about 45 km from the city of Berdian­sk on the bor­der with Donet­sk region.
The Troitske graphite deposit is asso­ci­at­ed with the Berestivs­ka syn­cline. The geo­log­i­cal struc­ture includes amphi­bole, biotite, garnet–biotite gneiss­es and calc-sil­i­cate rocks con­tain­ing inter­lay­ers of amphi­bole gneiss­es with graphite. The aver­age graphite con­tent is about 4.5%.

Pegmatites

The Yel­y­seivske peg­matite field is locat­ed with­in the Salty­chan­s­ka dome-shaped struc­ture in the basin of the Chokrak Riv­er and includes the Zele­na Mohy­la and Bal­ka Velyko­ho Taboru deposits. These deposits are asso­ci­at­ed with the Chokrak fault zone trend­ing north­west. The Zele­na Mohy­la deposit has been ful­ly mined out, and the quar­ry is now par­tial­ly flood­ed. It con­tained 15 peg­matite and aplite veins, with the largest reach­ing up to 90 m in thick­ness and up to 400 m in length. In the quar­ry walls, graph­ic peg­matite veins up to 5 m thick with sub­ver­ti­cal ori­en­ta­tion are still vis­i­ble.

The Bal­ka Velyko­ho Taboru deposit is cur­rent­ly being mined for feldspar raw mate­r­i­al used in the ceram­ic and glass indus­tries. The vein bod­ies con­sist main­ly of graph­ic and weak­ly graph­ic peg­matites, with less­er amounts of peg­matites of peg­mati­toid, coarse-grained, and blocky tex­tures. The largest vein reach­es 630 m in length and 40–50 m in thick­ness.

Granite

The most wide­spread nat­ur­al con­struc­tion mate­ri­als extract­ed in the region are gran­ites. Both grey (Dnipro) and red gran­ites are quar­ried here. Gran­ite out­crops occur in many parts of the region. Dnipro-type grey gran­ites are the most com­mon; they emerge at the sur­face along the Dnipro, Kon­ka, and Ber­da rivers. With­in the region, large gran­ite and crushed-stone deposits are being devel­oped, includ­ing Zapor­izke, Yantsivske, Salty­chanske, Mokri­anske, Pereda­tochynske, Tsare­vokos­tiantynivske, Stul­nivske, and Ostrikivske.

Diabases

Dia­base deposits occur as thick dike bod­ies intrud­ing migmatites, gneiss­es, and oth­er crys­talline rocks of the Prya­zov­ian megablock. Dia­base occur­rences are locat­ed along the Kupu­run gul­ly, which flows into the upper reach­es of the Kor­sak Riv­er val­ley. Green­ish-grey dia­bas­es are found north of the vil­lage of Maryaniv­ka. Dark grey dia­bas­es have been iden­ti­fied between the vil­lages of Zeleniv­ka and Yuriv­ka. Out­crops of dia­base can also be observed near the mouth of the Chokrak Riv­er, on the right bank of the Obitich­na Riv­er, as well as along the Kon­ka and Sukha Kon­ka rivers.

Porphyrites

The most com­mon vari­eties are augite and dia­base por­phyrites. The thick­ness of the deposits is gen­er­al­ly minor. The best deposit in the region is a dike locat­ed along the chan­nel of the Bil­man­ka Riv­er.

Amphibolites

Amphi­bo­lites occur as lens-shaped bod­ies along the Val­iukho­va Riv­er, the Tok­mak Riv­er, and the Yushan­li Riv­er, as well as near the Obitich­na, Kilty­chchia, and Ber­da rivers. Large amphi­bo­lite deposits are found in the Kainku­la gul­ly, near the vil­lage of Novoukrain­ka.

Kaolins

Kaolin deposits are con­cen­trat­ed in the cen­tral part of the region. The high­est-qual­i­ty kaolins occur in the Polo­hy dis­trict (in the upper reach­es of the Kon­ka Riv­er, bor­der­ing the crys­talline mas­sif; in the head­wa­ters of the left trib­u­taries of the Molochna Riv­er, along the west­ern mar­gin of the crys­talline mas­sif, and on the left bank of the Ber­da Riv­er). Kaolins are also found in the Orikhiv dis­trict. Kaolin deposits near the vil­lage of Kin­s­ki Roz­do­ry in the Bila gul­ly and near the town of Polo­hy are cur­rent­ly being devel­oped.

The Polo­hy kaolin and refrac­to­ry clay deposit extends along the banks of the Kon­ka Riv­er as a belt about 30 km long and approx­i­mate­ly 5 km wide. It con­sists of 10 sep­a­rate areas. The deposits are lens-shaped, asso­ci­at­ed with Neo­gene sed­i­ments, and occur at depths of 3–25 m. The total thick­ness of the ore bod­ies ranges from 1.5 to 15 m.
The Bil­i­aiv­ka kaolin deposit is locat­ed north of the city of Vil­ni­an­sk. It is asso­ci­at­ed with the Vil­ni­an­sk anti­cline of the Mokro­mosk­va gran­ite mas­sif and formed from the weath­er­ing prod­ucts of crys­talline rocks. At this deposit, kaolin occurs in three dis­tinct ore bod­ies.

Magnesite

Near the vil­lage of Veselyan­ka in the Zapor­izhzhia dis­trict, the Veselyan­ka occur­rence of talc-mag­ne­site is locat­ed and is cur­rent­ly not being devel­oped. The occur­rence is asso­ci­at­ed with the Kon­ka mag­net­ic anom­aly and is com­posed of meta­mor­phic com­plex­es of the Low­er Archean age, over­lain by Ceno­zoic deposits. The ore body has a tab­u­lar shape. Talc-mag­ne­sites are green­ish-grey to light-grey, dense, and have a greasy (soapy) feel. They con­sist main­ly of talc and mag­ne­site, which occur in approx­i­mate­ly equal pro­por­tions with­in the rock.

Clays

In the Polo­hy and Tok­mak dis­tricts, clay deposits suit­able for roof­ing tile pro­duc­tion are being exploit­ed. In total, 45 clay deposits suit­able for brick-and-tile pro­duc­tion are record­ed in the region, of which 4 are cur­rent­ly being devel­oped. Near the ham­let of Kon­s­ki Vody, clays suit­able for refrac­to­ry bricks occur. Refrac­to­ry clays are also found near the urban-type set­tle­ment of Roziv­ka, close to the head­wa­ters of the Mokrі Yaly Riv­er. Near the city of Tok­mak, clays suit­able for pot­tery pro­duc­tion are present. Two deposits of expand­ed clay raw mate­ri­als are known in the region — the Tok­mak and Vese­liv­ka deposits — both of which are cur­rent­ly not being devel­oped.

Sands

Glass sands are extract­ed at the Buryakiv­ka deposit, while the Mal­o­tok­machan­sk, Bilo­hiriv­ka, and Omel­nyk deposits are not cur­rent­ly exploit­ed. Two deposits of mold­ing sands are known in the region, one of which is in devel­op­ment. Near the city of Polo­hy, fine-grained clean quartz sands occur. High-qual­i­ty sands are extract­ed in the Polo­hy and Orikhiv dis­tricts and in the out­skirts of Zapor­izhzhia city. Sig­nif­i­cant sand reserves are also found near the vil­lages of Novo­danyliv­ka, Ter­pin­nya, Maiske, and the towns of Molochan­sk, Tok­mak, and Meli­topol.

Sandstones

Near the city of Vasyliv­ka, sand­stone deposits are known with a thick­ness of up to 6 m. To the south­west of the Polo­hy rail­way sta­tion, thick sand­stone lay­ers occur with a thick­ness of up to 10 m. Sig­nif­i­cant reserves are also iden­ti­fied in the Orikhiv, Cherni­hiv­ka, and Meli­topol dis­tricts.

Limestones

A lime­stone deposit is locat­ed on the bank of the Dnipro Riv­er near the vil­lage of Bilenke.

Opoka

The Novose­meniv­ka deposit of siliceous raw mate­ri­als is known in the region and is cur­rent­ly not being devel­oped. The min­er­al raw mate­r­i­al is rep­re­sent­ed by siliceous marl (tre­pel) and opo­ka (siliceous rock).

Groundwater and mineral waters

The ter­ri­to­ry of the region belongs to two major hydro­ge­o­log­i­cal basins: the Black Sea Arte­sian Basin and the Ukrain­ian Frac­tured Water Basin. The aquifers of the Black Sea Arte­sian Basin are asso­ci­at­ed with sed­i­men­ta­ry Cre­ta­ceous, Pale­o­gene, Neo­gene, and Qua­ter­nary deposits. The aquifers of the Ukrain­ian Frac­tured Water Basin are relat­ed to the frac­tured zone of Pre­cam­bri­an crys­talline rocks and their weath­er­ing prod­ucts, as well as sed­i­men­ta­ry Cre­ta­ceous, Pale­o­gene, and Neo­gene for­ma­tions. The exploitable reserves of fresh ground­wa­ter in Zapor­izhzhia Region suit­able for drink­ing water sup­ply amount to approx­i­mate­ly 300 thou­sand m³/day.

In Zapor­izhzhia Region, the Azov, Berdian­sk, Kyryliv­ka, Lazurne, Myrne, Molochan­sk, Meli­topol, and Prya­zovske deposits of potable ground­wa­ter and min­er­al waters are known. Drink­ing ground­wa­ter from the Myrne deposit is asso­ci­at­ed with the Buchak For­ma­tion of the Eocene. By chem­i­cal com­po­si­tion, the waters are sulfate–chloride–hydrocarbonate sodi­um waters with­out spe­cif­ic com­po­nents, with total min­er­al­iza­tion of 0.67 g/L. Ground­wa­ter from the Molochan­sk deposit is of chloride–sulfate–hydrocarbonate com­po­si­tion with calcium–sodium, magnesium–calcium–sodium, and sulfate–chloride–hydrocarbonate types. Min­er­al­iza­tion ranges from 0.6 to 0.9 g/L. Accord­ing to chem­i­cal and sanitary–bacteriological indi­ca­tors, “Molochan­s­ka” water meets the require­ments for nat­ur­al table waters.

In the city of Berdian­sk, sev­er­al min­er­al water sources are locat­ed. Iodine–bromine waters of high min­er­al­iza­tion, sodi­um chlo­ride waters of medi­um min­er­al­iza­tion, and ther­a­peu­tic mud (peloids) are extract­ed here. Min­er­al waters of the Kyryliv­ka deposit are asso­ci­at­ed with the Sar­ma­t­ian Stage of the Neo­gene and the Oligocene. Sar­ma­t­ian waters are chloride–sodium, medi­um-min­er­al­ized and are sim­i­lar in com­po­si­tion to the Myrhorod and Staroruss­ian water types. Oligocene waters are chloride–sodium brines with min­er­al­iza­tion of 50–52 g/L. The bromine con­tent reach­es bal­ne­o­log­i­cal stan­dards (60–100 mg/L). Ther­a­peu­tic mud is also local­ly present at the deposit.

Zapor­izhzhia region has sig­nif­i­cant reserves of var­i­ous min­er­als and min­er­al waters, which play an impor­tant role in the field of ener­gy, met­al­lur­gy, con­struc­tion and oth­er indus­tri­al sec­tors. The poten­tial of these resources con­tributes to the devel­op­ment of the econ­o­my and the cre­ation of new jobs in the region. The fur­ther devel­op­ment of the exploita­tion and use of these min­er­als can con­tribute to stim­u­lat­ing eco­nom­ic growth, rais­ing the stan­dard of liv­ing of the pop­u­la­tion and devel­op­ing the infra­struc­ture of the region. How­ev­er, envi­ron­men­tal aspects must also be tak­en into account and the sus­tain­able and effi­cient use of nat­ur­al resources must be ensured in order to pre­serve the envi­ron­ment and ensure the bal­anced devel­op­ment of the region.