Thor Lake is a deposit of rare metals located in the
Blachford Lake
Blachford Lake is a remote lake in Northern Canada, near Yellowknife. The lake is and sits on precambrian rock. The lake is located at 62 09.97'N, 112 40.96' W and is to the north of the start eastern arm of the Great Slave Lake. It is home of t ...
intrusive complex. It is situated 5 km north of the Hearne Channel of
Great Slave Lake
Great Slave Lake (french: Grand lac des Esclaves), known traditionally as Tıdeè in Tłı̨chǫ Yatıì (Dogrib), Tinde’e in Wıìlıìdeh Yatii / Tetsǫ́t’ıné Yatıé (Dogrib / Chipewyan), Tu Nedhé in Dëne Sųłıné Yatıé (Chi ...
,
Northwest Territories,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
, approximately 100 kilometers east-southeast of the capital city of
Yellowknife
Yellowknife (; Dogrib: ) is the capital, largest community, and only city in the Northwest Territories, Canada. It is on the northern shore of Great Slave Lake, about south of the Arctic Circle, on the west side of Yellowknife Bay near the ...
. Geologically located on the
Canadian Shield it is mostly composed of peralkaline
syenite (granitic rock with low quartz content). The Blatchford Lake complex was created in the early
Proterozoic, 2.14 Ga ago. The deposit is divided in several sub-structures.
In a small zone at the northern edge of the
syenite, the T-Zone, minerals like
bastnäsite
The mineral bastnäsite (or bastnaesite) is one of a family of three carbonate-fluoride minerals, which includes bastnäsite-( Ce) with a formula of (Ce, La)CO3F, bastnäsite-( La) with a formula of (La, Ce)CO3F, and bastnäsite-( Y) with a formul ...
,
phenakite
Phenakite or phenacite is a fairly rare nesosilicate mineral consisting of beryllium orthosilicate, Be2 Si O4. Occasionally used as a gemstone, phenakite occurs as isolated crystals, which are rhombohedral with parallel-faced hemihedrism, and are ...
and
xenotime
Xenotime is a rare-earth phosphate mineral, the major component of which is yttrium orthophosphate ( Y P O4). It forms a solid solution series with chernovite-(Y) ( Y As O4) and therefore may contain trace impurities of arsenic, as well as sili ...
can be found.
Within the Mackenzie mining district, Thor Lake may contain some of the largest deposits of light and heavy
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 silv ...
(REE) ores. The major elements of these ores are
europium,
terbium
Terbium is a chemical element with the symbol Tb and atomic number 65. It is a silvery-white, rare earth metal that is malleable, and ductile. The ninth member of the lanthanide series, terbium is a fairly electropositive metal that reacts with w ...
,
dysprosium
Dysprosium is the chemical element with the symbol Dy and atomic number 66. It is a rare-earth element in the lanthanide series with a metallic silver luster. Dysprosium is never found in nature as a free element, though, like other lanthanides, ...
,
neodymium
Neodymium is a chemical element with the symbol Nd and atomic number 60. It is the fourth member of the lanthanide series and is considered to be one of the rare-earth metals. It is a hard, slightly malleable, silvery metal that quickly tarnishe ...
,
gallium,
niobium,
thorium
Thorium is a weakly radioactive metallic chemical element with the symbol Th and atomic number 90. Thorium is silvery and tarnishes black when it is exposed to air, forming thorium dioxide; it is moderately soft and malleable and has a high ...
,
zirconium
Zirconium is a chemical element with the symbol Zr and atomic number 40. The name ''zirconium'' is taken from the name of the mineral zircon, the most important source of zirconium. The word is related to Persian '' zargun'' (zircon; ''zar-gun'' ...
and
beryllium
Beryllium is a chemical element with the symbol Be and atomic number 4. It is a steel-gray, strong, lightweight and brittle alkaline earth metal. It is a divalent element that occurs naturally only in combination with other elements to form m ...
. A significant proportion of the REE deposits lie within the boundaries of the Nechalacho Rare Earth Element Project, funded by
Avalon Rare Metals.
[
]
The extraction of these resources could be important for the global REE production, which almost exclusively occurs in China, especially around the
Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region
Inner Mongolia, officially the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. Its border includes most of the length of China's border with the country of Mongolia. Inner Mongolia also accounts for a ...
in
Bayan Obo
Bayan'obo Mining District, ( Mongolian: ''Bayan Oboɣ-a Aɣurqai-yin toɣoriɣ'', Баян-Овоо Уурхайн тойрог ( mn, italic=yes, "rich" + ovoo); ), or Baiyun-Obo or Baiyun'ebo, is a mining town in the west of Inner Mongolia, ...
.
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*{{cite book, url = https://books.google.com/books?id=1tWllDxMkEYC&pg=PA280, title = Giant Metallic Deposits: Future Sources of Industrial Metals, isbn = 978-3-642-12404-4, author1 = Laznicka, Peter, date = 2010-09-24
Cerny, P. and Trueman, DL 1985: Polylithionite from the rare-metal deposits of the Blatchford Lake alkaline complex; American Mineralogist, v. 70, p. 1127-1134
Mines in the Northwest Territories