The recent rise in the “criticality” of fluorspar has appeared to bolster the prospects of several fluorspar projects around the world (see “Industrial Minerals – Have they finally gone critical?”). Ahead of the pack is the Lost Sheep Mine in Utah, USA. In Germany, steps are being taken to re-open the Käfersteige mine. In Australia, [...]
Seen & Heard at Fluorine Forum 2023 Market Review | Logistics | China | Mongolia | New Sources | Batteries | Welding | Fluoropolymers It was the Fluorine Forum that broke our attendance record: Fluorine Forum 2023, at Mandelieu-La-Napoule, 16-18 October 2023, was IMFORMED’s largest event to date for the global fluorspar market. Some 200 [...]
Introduction to Mining Engineering’s IM Annual Review July 2024 by Mike O'Driscoll* The importance of industrial minerals to the world economy and everyday lives always used to be a hard sell to the uninitiated. Just having to explain what they are and how they are characterised in the context of the world mining industry was [...]
Review of Salt Forum 2023 Supply & Demand Trends | New Source Projects | Southern Africa | Senegal | Europe | APAC | India | Australia | Processing | Logistics IMFORMED has organised its acclaimed industrial mineral Forums in many interesting locations, and one of the most remote, adventurous, and spectacular venues was for Salt [...]
Leading world magnesia and refractories producer RHI Magnesita (RHIM) plans to acquire US diverse refractory product and mineral producer Resco Group for US$430m. The move, announced by the Vienna-based group on 30 March 2024, marks a reinforcing of RHIM’s position in the USA following last year’s opening of its regional head office in Tampa, Florida, [...]
Review of the XII European Congress of Refractory Raw Materials, Machinery & Installation Graphite | Alumina | Andalusite | Silicon Carbide | Magnesia | Logistics | Decarbonisation | Recycling Kicking off this year’s European refractory events calendar, Seville in the springtime appeared the perfect place to gather for IMFORMED’s second refractories conference co-organised with ANFRE [...]
Focus on refractory & abrasive markets By Nicholaus Rohleder, Co-Founder, Climate Commodities* The nexus between industrial minerals and national security is a topic of paramount importance, often overlooked in broader discussions about defence readiness and strategic autonomy. Title Image: An illustration of the LGM-35A Sentinel, the US Air Force’s newest weapon system under development as [...]
Magnesia World Sources Map® Primary world sources & production capacity of key magnesia raw materials Magnesite | Caustic calcined magnesia | Dead burned magnesia | Fused magnesia | Magnesium hydroxide | Brucite | Huntite | Dunite | Olivine | Kieserite Distributed to attendees at all IMFORMED conferences and all relevant industry events | Extra print & PDF copies for sale In the supply [...]
“Squaring the circle” is a problem in geometry that was first proposed in Greek mathematics. The expression “squaring the circle” is also sometimes used as a metaphor for trying to do the “impossible”, and can also mean to bring together two things which are normally thought to be so different that they cannot exist together [...]
REFRACTORIES | RECYCLING | MAGNESIA | BARITE | OILFIELD | FLUORINE | CHINA | SALT As IMFORMED nears its ninth anniversary, Mike and Ismene would like to thank all our customers, sponsors, friends, and families for their unstinting support during 2023. We considered 2023 to be the first "normal" year post-pandemic as most delegates were able to [...]
