KNOW-IT-ALL KID FOR IDUSTRIAL MINERALS
Industrial minerals - the minerals of the third millennium
Industrial minerals group covers the non-metallic materials used as minerals (eg asbestos, talc, barite, fluorite, graphite, corundum, etc.). The group of industrial minerals includes these materials which are used as mineral aggregates and rocks (eg limestone, dolomite, fireclay, bentonite, perlite, gypsum and others. ).
The main consumers of industrial minerals are construction, cement, the refractory, glass, porcelain, the electric, faience, sanitary, chemical, paper, food and other industries, metallurgy, metal casting, engineering, agriculture and other than sectors.
According to their application in industry, industrial minerals are used as:
Raw materials for chemical industry (Rock salt, apatite and phosphorite, sulphur, pyrite, barite, witherite, fluorite and borates);
Raw materials for ceramics and refractories (clays, kaolinе, feldspars, quartz, quartzite, magnesite, graphite, asbestos, sillimanite, andalusite , etc. );
Acid-resistant materials (talc, andesite, basalt, diabas, clay and asbestos);
Fillers, paints, adsorbents (talc, barite, kaolin, graphite, chalk, coloured clays, diatomite, etc. );
Construction quarry materials (various solid, precipitated and metamorphic rocks);
Raw materials for connecting building materials (limestone, gypsum, anhydrite, marlstones, clays, magnesite, diatomite, pumice , etc . )
Insulation Materials (asbestos muscovite, talc, pumice, etc. ).
Industrial minerals are used in virtually all sectors of economic activity. Industrial minerals are commonly used in industry or construction as extracted after some mechanical processing , while in other cases they are suitable for industry, after undergoing a chemical or thermal treatment.
Industrial minerals in Bulgaria
In Bulgaria there are over 260 deposits of industrial minerals and construction materials. The more important are those of kaolin, bentonite, clays, rock salt, limestone, dolomite, quartz, gypsum, barite, fluorite, quartzite, zeolite, perlite, etc. The extraction of building stone materials and has more than 168 operating deposits . About 120 types of products are offered on the market, which meet approximately 95% of costumers needs.
In Bulgaria, industrial minerals are widely spread , with different mineral content. They are over 60 types , 35 of which are used in industry and construction. Bulgaria has available considerable amounts of industrial deposits , concrete clays, limestone for the feed industry - Cretaceous, chalk and organogene limestone, gypsum, kaolin sands, zeolite material, perlite, etc.
