Rio Tito-First trona project, first time in Turkey

摘要

Rio Tinto is set to begin pilot-scale studies in 2004 on the Kazan trona project in central Turkey. The Kazan project is Rio Tinto Industrial Minerals Division's first trona project and Rio Tinto's first project in Turkey. The Kazan trona deposit is located 35 km (22 miles) northwest of Ankara. The company's geologists discovered the deposit in 1998. Since then, the company has been exploring the area and performing resource evaluation. If the project goes into commercial operation, it could result in about 6 billion dollars in economic value for Turkey. Rio Tinto has drilled more than 40 km (25 miles) of core since the project began. The deposit consists of 12 trona beds. They vary in depth from 420 m (1,380 ft) in the northwest to 850 m (2,790 ft) in the southeast. The average thickness ranges from 54 to 109 m (177 to 360 ft). The beds contain about 607 Mt (669 million st) of economic trona with an average grade of 31 percent.