Rare Met­als: dis­tri­b­u­tion and gen­e­sis

Ukraine is a min­ing coun­try well-endowed with reserves and pro­ject­ed resources of rare and rare earth met­als. How­ev­er, this nat­u­ral­ly rich poten­tial for the coun­try’s eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment has not been ful­ly uti­lized to date.

Most deposits and promis­ing ore occur­rences of rare met­al min­er­al­iza­tion have been dis­cov­ered with­in the Ukrain­ian Shield, which is dis­tin­guished as a large rare met­al province. With­in its bound­aries, 22 rare met­al for­ma­tions have been iden­ti­fied, formed main­ly in con­nec­tion with Ear­ly Pro­tero­zoic mobile belts and Late Pro­tero­zoic super­im­posed zones of tec­ton­ic-mag­mat­ic and tec­ton­ic-meta­so­mat­ic acti­va­tion. With­in these zones, gran­i­toid and alka­line mag­ma­tism, peg­matite for­ma­tion, and meta­so­mat­ic process­es are man­i­fest­ed. There are also sev­er­al ore for­ma­tions asso­ci­at­ed with ore-bear­ing weath­er­ing crusts and plac­ers. The most inter­est­ing are com­plex deposits asso­ci­at­ed with rare met­al gran­ites and syen­ites, replaced peg­matites and alka­line meta­so­matites.

In Ukraine, the Perzhanske beryl­li­um deposit, Zhov­torichenske ura­ni­um-vana­di­um-scan­di­um deposit have been explored and pre­pared for devel­op­ment, and com­plex deposits of apatite-rare earth-nio­bi­um (Novopoltavske) and zir­co­ni­um-nio­bi­um ores (Mazurivske) have been explored.

The Azov deposit of flu­o­rite-zir­co­ni­um-rare earth ores is being explored. Promis­ing objects for lithi­um ores are the Polokhivske, Stanku­vatske, and Shevchenkivske deposits. A num­ber of promis­ing ore occur­rences of tan­ta­lum, nio­bi­um, yttri­um rare earths, tin, molyb­de­num, and tung­sten have been iden­ti­fied.

Vana­di­um, gal­li­um, ger­ma­ni­um, scan­di­um, hafni­um, bis­muth, and anti­mo­ny can be extract­ed as by-prod­ucts from fer­rous and non-fer­rous met­al ores (fer­rug­i­nous quartzites, ilmenite gab­bros, man­ganese, nick­el, and cinnabar ores). Var­i­ous rare met­als — Sc, V, Ga, Ge, Ta, Nb, TR, V, Zr — can be extract­ed from var­i­ous indus­tri­al wastes.

Among the known deposits, of par­tic­u­lar inter­est are the largest and unique ones that can take their respec­tive places in the world and pri­mar­i­ly Euro­pean bal­ance of dis­tri­b­u­tion and use of min­er­al resources. These are pri­mar­i­ly the unique Perzhanske beryl­li­um and Azov zir­co­ni­um-rare earth deposits and major lithi­um sources — Polokhivske, Stanku­vatske, Shevchenkivske deposits.

The Perzhanske deposit belongs to a new and so far unique type of high-qual­i­ty beryl­li­um ores in alka­line (feldspar) meta­so­matites asso­ci­at­ed with gen­thelvite, which was pre­vi­ous­ly con­sid­ered a very rare min­er­al. This deposit has been explored, pre­pared for exploita­tion, and accom­pa­ny­ing explorato­ry assess­ment of zir­co­ni­um, rare earths, nio­bi­um, tan­ta­lum, tin, and flu­o­rite has been per­formed. Devel­op­ment of this deposit will allow for the first time to intro­duce a new geo­log­i­cal-indus­tri­al type of this min­er­al raw mate­r­i­al into world prac­tice. Along with beryl­li­um, Ta, Nb, TR, Zr, F, Li, Mo, Sn, W, Au, Ag, Zn, Cd can be extract­ed at the Perzhanske deposit.

The Azov deposit of zir­co­ni­um-rare earth ores is con­fined to alka­line syen­ites and is the largest in Europe. Min­er­al­iza­tion is asso­ci­at­ed with meta­so­mat­ic for­ma­tions: taxitic olivine-amphi­bo­lite alka­line-feldspar syen­ites. Ore min­er­als are rep­re­sent­ed by zir­con, orthite, britho­lite, bast­nae­site, flu­o­rite. The rare earth group is quite diverse and con­sists of ceri­um, lan­thanum, neodymi­um, erbium, samar­i­um, lutetium, and yttri­um. Explorato­ry assess­ment work is being car­ried out at the Azov deposit; it can be pre­pared for exploita­tion in a short time.

The Polokhivske, Stanku­vatske, Shevchenkivske lithi­um deposits are asso­ci­at­ed with petal­ite-spo­dumene peg­matites with accom­pa­ny­ing Nb, Ta, Cs. They are char­ac­ter­ized by high con­cen­tra­tions of use­ful com­po­nents, coin­ci­dence with iron ore and ura­ni­um fields, and prox­im­i­ty to oper­at­ing min­ing enter­pris­es. Iron-free lithi­um con­cen­trates can also be used for ceram­ics and glass pro­duc­tion, which is of great impor­tance for Ukraine. Pre­lim­i­nar­i­ly esti­mat­ed reserves of lithi­um ores and geo­log­i­cal-eco­nom­ic para­me­ters of these deposits allow them to be clas­si­fied as high­ly prof­itable com­plex ore objects.

The Mazurivske deposit of zir­co­ni­um-nio­bi­um-tan­ta­lum ores, asso­ci­at­ed with nepheline syen­ites (mar­i­upo­lites), should also be con­sid­ered high­ly promis­ing. The Novopoltavske deposit of com­plex phos­pho­rite-rare earth-rare met­al ores in car­bon­atites has also been explored. It can be an object for extrac­tion of rare earths, nio­bi­um, and tan­ta­lum dur­ing min­ing of the main com­po­nent — apatite.

In recent years, in con­nec­tion with uran­i­f­er­ous albitites and aegirinites of the Kryvyi Rih-Kre­menchuk zone, along with ura­ni­um and iron, vana­di­um-scan­di­um ores (Zhovti Vody deposit) have been iden­ti­fied with con­cen­tra­tion of ore com­po­nents in aegirine-acmite. Tech­nol­o­gy for scan­di­um extrac­tion from these ores has been devel­oped.

Ukraine is also the largest tita­ni­um-zir­co­ni­um plac­er province with con­ti­nen­tal, coastal-marine, and beach for­ma­tions. Cur­rent­ly, the large Malyshiv­ske deposit, asso­ci­at­ed with high­ly pro­duc­tive stra­ta of Sar­ma­t­ian quartz sands, is being exploit­ed. This object was the main sup­pli­er of zir­co­ni­um con­cen­trates in the for­mer Sovi­et Union. Ilmenite, rutile, and kyan­ite-sil­li­man­ite prod­ucts are extract­ed as by-prod­ucts, and graphite from zir­co­ni­um con­cen­trates. A num­ber of new promis­ing objects have been iden­ti­fied along the north­ern and south­east­ern slopes of the Ukrain­ian Shield and the north­east­ern edge of the Dnieper-Donet­sk depres­sion.

The wide devel­op­ment of min­ing, met­al­lur­gi­cal, chem­i­cal, and machine-build­ing indus­tries in the coun­try cre­ates favor­able pre­req­ui­sites for the real­iza­tion of its own min­er­al resource base of rare met­als, which is the basis for the devel­op­ment of high tech­nolo­gies and high-qual­i­ty alloys, struc­tures, and machines.

The rare met­al min­er­al resource poten­tial of Ukraine iden­ti­fied to date is the largest on the Euro­pean con­ti­nent and can meet the needs of ALL Euro­pean coun­tries. Ukraine is inter­est­ed in devel­op­ing mutu­al­ly ben­e­fi­cial inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion for fur­ther eval­u­a­tion and effec­tive devel­op­ment of rare met­al deposits based on mod­ern tech­nolo­gies and tak­ing into account inter­na­tion­al cer­tifi­cates for rare met­al raw mate­ri­als and their pro­cess­ing prod­ucts.