The Steenkampskraal mine is a

rare-earth element The rare-earth elements (REE), also called the rare-earth metals or (in context) rare-earth oxides or sometimes the lanthanides (yttrium and scandium are usually included as rare earths), are a set of 17 nearly-indistinguishable lustrous silve ...

s (REEs) mine north of

Vanrhynsdorp Van Rhynsdorp (Afrikaans: Vanrhynsdorp) is a settlement in West Coast District Municipality in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Van Rhynsdorp was founded as Trutro ("TroeTroe") after the area was first explored by Europeans in 1661 by P ...

in the

Western Cape The Western Cape is a province of South Africa, situated on the south-western coast of the country. It is the fourth largest of the nine provinces with an area of , and the third most populous, with an estimated 7 million inhabitants in 2020 ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

. The mine was operated by Anglo American Corporation from 1952 to 1963. In addition to the mining right area of 474 hectares, the company also owns three surrounding farms with a total area of about 7,000 hectares. Steenkampskraal has the highest grade Rare Earth deposit in the world. It has a resource of about 605,000 tons at an average grade of 14.4% Total Rare Earth Oxide (TREO) for a total of 86,900 tons contained TREO. Each ton of ore in the Steenkampskraal mine contains rare earths to the value of approximately US$3,000 at present market prices. The total quantity of neodymium in the mine is 15,600 tons at a resource grade of 2.58% Nd₂O₃.

References

* Steenkampskraal, "Company & PropertyMine", http://www.infomine.com/index/properties/Steenkampskraal.html * Steenkampskraal, "Rare Earths", https://www.steenkampskraal.com/
Great Western Minerals Group Ltd: Steenkampskraal Rare Earth Element Project, South AfricaTechnical Report and Mineral Resource Estimate 15 December2012
* Mines in South Africa Buildings and structures in the Western Cape Economy of the Western Cape {{WesternCape-geo-stub