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101 Interesting Facts About Canada ~ Caesium


Did you know that Canada is the world's largest producer of Caesium (cesium)?


Tanco Mine or Bernic Lake mine is an underground caesium (1) and tantalum mine, owned and operated by Sinomine on the north west shore of Bernic Lake, Manitoba, Canada. The mine has the largest known deposit of pollucite (2) and is also the world's largest producer of caesium. ~Wikipedia

Caesium is a relatively uncommon element that can be mined in only a few places in the world. The world's largest deposit of pollucite, which is the principal ore of cesium, is in a zoned pegmatite (3) at Bernic Lake, Canada, and accounts for more than two-thirds of world reserves. ~ https://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2004/1432/2004-1432.pdf

1.  Caesium (IUPAC spelling) (also spelled cesium in American English) is a chemical element with the symbol Cs and atomic number 55. It is a soft, silvery-golden alkali metal with a melting point of 28.5 °C (83.3 °F), which makes it one of only five elemental metals that are liquid at or near room temperature. ~ Wikipedia

2.  Pollucite  is a zeolite mineral with the formula (Cs,Na)2Al2Si4O12·2H2O with iron, calcium, rubidium and potassium as common substituting elements. It is important as a significant ore of caesium and sometimes rubidium. It forms a solid solution series with analcime. ~ Wikipedia

3.  A pegmatite is an igneous rock, formed by slow crystallization at high temperature and pressure at depth, and exhibiting large interlocking crystals usually greater in size than 2.5 cm (1 in). ~ Google Search

More information . . . https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cesium---the-most-important-metal-never-heard-of-301029446.html

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