MINERALS AND ENERGY RESOURCES

 “The energy of the mind is the essence of life”.
MINERALS
Homogenous naturally occurring substance with a definable internal structure.
Minerals are found in varied forms in nature ranging from the hardest diamond to the softest
tale. They are usually found in “ores”.
ROCKS
Rocks are combination of homogenous substances called minerals. Some rocksfor instance,
limestone consist of a single mineral only but majority of the rock consist of several minerals in
varying proportions.
CLASSIFICATION OF MINERALS 
A. Metallic Mineral
Metallic minerals are those which can be melted to obtain new products.

1.Ferrous Mineral - Ferrous metal primarily contains iron and steel.Example: Iron , ore,
manganese
2. Non-Ferrous Mineral – contains litte iron or steel
Example: Copper, Bauxite

B. Non – Metallic Minerals

Non – metallic Minerals are those which do not yield new products onmelting.
Conservation of Minerals
Mining companies can profitably extract most minerals from only where they occur in
large deposits. Industries first develop the highest grade and most easily minable ores.
When they are depleted, mining companies turn to lower gradeand harder to mine ores.
Many such deposits require advance technology and largeamount of energy to mine.
Some take so much energy that they cannot be profitablydeveloped. Deposits of
minerals are unevenly distributed around the world. Thisuneven distribution of minerals
has played a major role in history.
Hazards of Mining
Mining can result in a number od adverse effects on the environment. Surface mining of
coal completely eliminates existing vegetation, destroys the genetic soil profile,
displaces or destroys wildlife and habitat, degrades air quality, alters current land uses
and to some extent permanently changes the general topography of thearea mined.
Higher energy always wins and the light energy always drowns out the darkness…
-Lada Ray
Energy Resources
Energy is the fundamental component to our daily lives andeveryday we use energy or
power in some form or another. The law of conservation states that energy can neither
be created or destroyed. Itmeans that as energy is being used, it does not disappear, but
ratheris converted into another form of energy.
Conventional Sources of Energy
The sources of energy which have been in use for a long time areexhaustible except
water. They cause pollutionwhen used as they emitsmoke and ash. They are very
 expensive to be maintained, stored andtransmitted as they are carried over a long
distance through transmissiongrid and lines.
Non-Coventional Sources of Energy
The resources which are yet in the process of development overThe past few years.
Example: Solar, wind Tidal, Biogas, Biomass andGeothermal. They are inexhaustible.
They are generally pollution free. Lessexpensive due to local sue and easy to maintain.
Let Us Save Our Mother Earth…

A.OCEAN
The ocean is one of the earth’s most valuable natural resources. It providesfood for us in the
form of fish and selfish- about 200 billion pounds are caughteach year. It is used for
transportation-both travel and shipping. It provides atreasured source of recreation for
humans. It is mined for minerals (salt, sand,gravel and some manganese, copper, nickel, iron
and cobalt can be found in thedeep sea) and drilled for crude oil. It plays critical role in
removing carbon fromthe atmosphere and providing oxygen. It regulates Earth’s climate. It is
anincreasing important source of biochemical organisms with enormous potentialfor fighting
disease.
Fishing Facts:The oceans have been fished for thousands of years and an integral part of human
society. Fish have been important to the world economy for all of theseyears. Fisheries of today
provide about 16% total world’s protein with higherpercentage occurring in developing nations.
The world fisheries refer to all of thefishing activities in the ocean; whether they are to obtain
fish for the commercialfishing industry, for recreation to obtain environmental fish or fish oil.

Shipping:
The world shipping refers to the activity of moving cargo with ships inbetween seaport. Naval
ships are usually responsible for transporting most of trade from one country to another and
are called merchant navies. In theory,shipping can have a low impact on the environment. It is
safe and profitable foreconomies around the world. However, serious problems occur with
shipping of oil, dumping of waste water in the ocean, chemical accidents at sea, inevitable
airand water pollution.

Tourism:
Tourism is the fastest growing division of the world economy and isresponsible for more than
200 million jobs all over the world. Tourism industry isbased on natural resources present in
each country and usually negatively affectecosystem because it is often left unmanaged.
However, sustainable tourism canactually promote conservation of the environment.

Mining:
Humans began to mine the ocean floor for diamonds, gold, silver,manganese, gravel, sands and
gas hydrates. Mining the ocean can be devastatingto the natural ecosystem. Dredging of any
kind pulls up the ocean floor resultingin wide spread destruction of marine animal habitats, as
well as wiping out vastnumbers of fishes and invertebrates.

Climate Buffer
The ocean is an integral component of the world’s climate due to itscapacity to collect, drive
and mix water, heat and carbon dioxide. The ocean canhold and circulate more water, heat and
carbon dioxide than the atmospherealthough the components of the earth’s climate are
constantly exchanged.

Oxygen Production:
Gases in the atmosphere like carbon, nitrogen, sulfur and oxygen aredissolved through the
water cycle. The gases that are now crucial to all ecosystemand biological processes originally
came from the inside layers of the earth duringthe period when the earth was first formed. The
rate of flow for oxygen as well asother gases is controlled by biological processes, especially
metabolism of organisms like prokaryotes and bacteria.

C. Forest
A forest is a large area dominated by trees. It is an extremely importantnatural resource
that can potentially be sustainably harvested and managed toyield a diversity of
commodities of economic importance. These resourcescontinue to be used for
subsistence as well as commercial recreational purposes.Wood is far the most
important products harvested from forests. The woodis commonly manufactured into
paper, lumber, plywood and other products. Inaddition, in most of forested regions of
the less developed world firewood is themost important source of energy used for
cooking and other purposes. Plants andberries are harvested on regular bases for
personal consumption and economicpurposes. Many other plant products can also be
collected from forests, such asfruits, nuts, mushrooms, and latex for manufacturing
rubber. In addition, manyspecies of animals are hunted in forests, for recreation or for
subsistence.Potentially, all of these forest products can be sustainably
harvested.Unfortunately, in most cases forests have been unsustainably over harvested,
resulting in the mining of forest resource and wide spread ecological degradation.It is
critical that in the future all forest harvesting is conducted in a manner that
isresponsible in terms of sustaining the resource.The global forest area is at least one-
third smaller than it was prior to theextensive deforestation caused by human activities.
Most of the deforested landhas been converted to permanent agricultural use, but
some has beenecologically degraded into semi-desert or desert. This global
deforestation, whichis continuing apace, is one of the most serious environmental crisis.

Agricultural and Soil Resources

Agricultural soil science is a branch of soil science that deals with the studyof edaphic
conditions as they relate to the production of food and fiber. In this context,it is also a
constituent of the field of agronomy and is thus also described as soilagronomy

History
Prior to the development of pedology in the 19th century, agricultural soil science(or
edaphology) was the only branch of soil science. The bias of early soil sciencetoward
viewing soils only in terms of their agricultural potential continues to define thesoil
science profession in both academic and popular settings as of 2006. (Baveye, 2006)

Current status
Agricultural soil science follows the holistic method. Soil is investigated in relation toand
as integral part of terrestrial ecosystems but is also recognized asa manageable natural
resource.

Agricultural soil science studies the chemical, physical, biological, and

mineralogicalcomposition of soils as they relate to agriculture. Agricultural soil scientists
developmethods that will improve the use of soil and increase the production of food
and fibercrops. Emphasis continues to grow on the importance of soil sustainability.
Soildegradation such as erosion, compaction, lowered fertility, and contamination
continueto be serious concerns.[1] They conduct research in irrigation and drainage,
tillage, soilclassification, plant nutrition, soil fertility, and other areas.
Although maximizing plant (and thus animal) production is a valid goal, sometimes itmay
come at high cost which can be readily evident (e.g. massive cropdisease stemming from
monoculture) or long-term (e.g. impact of chemical fertilizersand pesticides on human
health). An agricultural soil scientist may come up with a planthat can maximize
production using sustainable methods and solutions, and in order todo that he must
look into a number of science fields including agriculturalscience, physics, chemistry,
biology, meteorology and geology.

Soil variables

Some soil variables of special interest to agricultural soil science are:

Soil texture or soil composition: Soils are composed of solid particles of various sizes.
Indecreasing order, these particles are sand, silt and clay. Every soil can be
classifiedaccording to the relative percentage of sand, silt and clay it contains.

Aeration and porosity: Atmospheric air contains elements suchas oxygen, nitrogen,
carbon and others. These elements are prerequisites for life onEarth. Particularly, all
cells (including root cells) require oxygen to function and if conditions become
anaerobic they f ail to respire and metabolize. Aeration in this contextrefers to the
mechanisms by which air is delivered to the soil. In natural ecosystems soilaeration is
chiefly accomplished through the vibrant activity of the biota. Humanscommonly aerate
the soil by tilling and plowing, yet such practice maycause degradation. Porosity refers
to the air-holding capacity of the soil. Seealso characterization of pore space in soil.

Drainage: In soils of bad drainage the water delivered through rain or irrigation maypool
and stagnate. As a result, prevail anaerobic conditions and plant roots
suffocate.Stagnant water also favors plant-attacking water molds. In soils of excess
drainage, onthe other hand, plants don't get to absorb adequate water and nutrients
arewashed from the porous medium to end up in groundwater reserves.
Water content: Without soil moisture there is no transpiration, no growth andplants
wilt. Technically, plant cells loose their pressure (see osmotic pressure and
turgorpressure). Plants contribute directly to soil moisture. For instance, they create a
leafy cover that minimizes the evaporative effects of solar radiation. But even when
plants orparts of plants die, the decaying plant matter produces a thick organic cover
thatprotects the soil from evaporation, erosion and compaction. For more on this
subjectsee mulch.

Water potential: Water potential describes the tendency of the water to flow from
onearea of the soil to another. While water delivered to the soil surface normally
flowsdownward due to gravity, at some point it meets increased pressure which causes
areverse upward flow. This effect is known as water suction.

Horizonation: Typically found in advanced and mature soils, horizonation refers to

thecreation of soil layers with differing characteristics. It affects almost all soil variables.

Fertility: A fertile soil is one rich in nutrients and organic matter. Modern
agriculturalmethods have rendered much of the arable land infertile. In such cases, soil
can nolonger support on its own plants with high nutritional demand and thus needs
anexternal source of nutrients. However, there are cases where human activity is
thoughtto be responsible for transforming rather normal soils into super-fertile ones
(see terrapreta).

Biota and soil biota: Organisms interact with the soil and contribute to its quality
ininnumerable ways. Sometimes the nature of interaction may be unclear, yet a rule
isbecoming evident: The amount and diversity of the biota is "proportional" to the
qualityof the soil. Clades of interestinclude bacteria, fungi, nematodes, annelids and
arthropods.

Soil acidity or soil pH and cation-exchange capacity: Root cells act as hydrogenpumps
and the surrounding concentration of hydrogen ions affects their ability toabsorb
nutrients. pH is a measure of this concentration. Each plant species achievesmaximum
growth in a particular pH range, yet the vast majority of edible plants cangrow in soil pH
between 5.0 and 7.5.

Soil Fertility Agricultural soil scientists study ways to make soils more productive. They
classify soilsand test them to determine whether they contain nutrients vital to plant
growth. Suchnutritional substances include compounds of nitrogen, phosphorus, and
potassium. If acertain soil is deficient in these substances, fertilizers may provide them.
Agricultural soil scientists investigate the movement of nutrients through the soil, and
the amountof nutrients absorbed by a plant's roots. Agricultural soil scientists also
examine thedevelopment of roots and their relation to the soil. Some agricultural soil
scientists tryto understand the structure and f unction of soils in relation to soil fertility.
They graspthe structure of soil as porous solid. The solid frames of soil consist of mineral
derivedfrom the rocks and organic matter originated from the dead bodies of
variousorganisms. The pore space of the soil is essential for the soil to become
productive.Small pores serve as water reservoir supplying water to plants and other
organisms inthe soil during the rain-less period. The water in the small pores of soils is
not purewater; they call it soil solution. In soil solution, various plant nutrients derived
fromminerals and organic matters in the soil are there. This is measured through the
cationexchange capacity. Large pores serve as water drainage pipe to allow the
excessivewater pass through the soil, during the heavy rains. They also serve as air tank
tosupply oxygen to plant roots and other living beings in the soil. In short, agricultural
soilscientists see the soil as a vessel, the most precious one for us, containing all of
thesubstances needed by the plants and other living beings on earth.

Soil Preservation
In addition, agricultural soil scientists develop methods to preserve the
agriculturalproductivity of soil and to decrease the effects on productivity of erosion by
wind andwater. For example, a technique called contour plowing may be used to
prevent soilerosion and conserve rainfall. Researchers in agricultural soil science also
seek ways touse the soil more effectively in addressing associated challenges.
Suchchallengesinclude the beneficial reuse of human and animal wastes using
agriculturalcrops; agricultural soil management aspects of preventing water pollution
and the build-up in agricultural soil of chemical pesticides