The Amounts of Precious Metals in Tar Sands
Bitumen-rich mud, also called tar sands, has, as of 2010, only recently become cost-effective to exploit for oil. Yet oil is not the only valuable substance that tar sands contain. They also have small amounts of silver, gold, platinum and even rhenium, the third-rarest element on Earth.
Other People Are Reading
-
Quantities of Precious Metals
-
The amounts of precious metals in tar sands are extremely small. Tar sands have been found in places to contain 3 to 50 parts per billion of rhenium and 0.05 parts per million of gold. However, some deposits contain higher concentrations than others, and certain tar sands may contain commercially significant amounts of precious metals.
Extraction
-
Just because tar sands contain these metals does not mean extraction is economically viable. Seawater contains gold, too, but getting it out is too expensive. Various methods have been proposed to extract the metals from tar sands, but none is being utilized on a commercial scale as of 2010.
-
Other Drawbacks
-
The exploitation of tar sands is controversial because of its impact on the environment. To the cost of extracting metals you have to add costs to ecosystems and the industries that depend upon them, such as fisheries. There are more cost-effective and less-damaging ways of obtaining precious metals, not to mention the fact that such substances are infinitely recyclable.
-
