I2M Experience in Natural Resource Development Projects
Over the past 30 years, the development of natural resources such as coal, oil & gas, uranium, and other natural resources required by society involved geologists and engineers with training in a variety of subfields. In the 1960s and 1970s, many geologists were trained for serving the specialized needs of the oil & gas industry, the mining industry, the ground-water supply industry, and for serving technical regulatory functions in state and federal agencies. Members of the I2M management team, were among the relatively few who were also trained as hydrogeologists to serve not only these industries and agencies but also to serve the growing environmental field. Beginning in the 1970s, ground water was and remains today the central focus of state and federal environmental regulations.
Appropriately trained hydrogeologists served in a range of industrial and state and federal regulatory functions. Into the 21st Century, the multi-use fields of hydrogeology, environmental geology, and economic geology play even more important roles in mineral exploration and mining, water supply, and oil & gas. Hence, the I2M Management team, supported by a seasoned group of I2M Associates, offer a sound interdisciplinary perspective to clients and projects, ranging from the development of natural resources (such as uranium, gold, and other natural resources), reserve analysis and assessment (especially uranium, gold and industrial minerals), and the associated environmental issues surrounding such projects today.
Most of the assembled group of I2M Associates have worked previously with either Mr. King or Mr. Campbell from the late 1960s in consulting or in managing and executing mineral exploration programs in the U.S. and overseas to the early 1990s within national consulting companies and DuPont Environmental. I2M also provides a range of evaluations involving mining economics, reserve evaluations, market analyses, and associated environmental investigations (see Projects, Mining and other evaluations). Some of the personnel who will be brought to bear in projects are listed below. For additional information on the backgrounds of each of the I2M Principals and Associates, click on the links provided (Personnel).
Mineral exploration and environmental investigations have many common characteristics. Both require a familiarity with the geologic literature and both involve drilling, sampling, and analyzing for anomalous compounds. Mineral exploration involves the search and evaluation of concentrations of economic metals and other elements found in naturally-occurring deposits at or near the surface of the earth. Mining involves the removal of overburden and ore-grade materials to generate economic benefit. Mining of some minerals also is conducted via in-situ methods by the uranium industry, generally called solution mining. It is an environmentally friendly method of mineral extraction and can scientifically reduce production costs relative to those involved in surface and underground mining of the past. See paper by Campbell, et al., 2007 (Here).
Value is created by mining a mineral commodity for use by society in recovering a product of value to society. For example, gold has an intrinsic value, as is, but uranium ore needs to be chemically re-combined into "yellowcake" which then is enriched to make pellets for use in nuclear power reactor cores. Successful mining projects consist of multi-disciplinary activities, such as in heap leaching of precious metals, for example, and require a careful blend and balance of geological, chemical, geotechnical, engineering, financial, environmental and managerial expertise.
In general, mining and mineral resources are directly linked to the environmental field. The former is the first stage of supplying society with its building blocks while the latter is the last stage of cleaning up after society's needs have been met. As society learns to mine its needed raw materials in more environmentally sound ways, so too will society learn to produce the products it needs in more environmentally friendly ways by improving handling and storage techniques and by reducing waste. In the process of making a product, wastes are produced which have historically been improperly handled and expediently disposed of at locations that often threatened the health and well being of humans and the environment. Now, environmental investigations search for and evaluate the residual concentrations of anthropogenic waste or by-products such as metals, hydrocarbons, solvents, pesticides, herbicides, and other industrial waste constituents found in and around industrial centers in concentrations considered, in many cases, to be potentially dangerous to human health and the environment, i.e., to other fauna, flora and other natural resources.
The mining and mineral resources disciplines involve a number of activities, ranging from developing or reviewing mineral exploration programs for potential financial investors, through developing mining plans, to environmental permitting. Any of the above activities, analyses, evaluations, or assessments must be conducted by personnel with the appropriate training and experience and the requisite professional geological and engineering certifications and/or state licenses.
