In the broadest definition, industrial minerals are all those minerals, including construction materials, with an economic use typically excluding energy minerals, metals and gemstones (except where the latter has industrial applications, such as diamond). The UK produces a wide range of industrial minerals including:
- ball clay
- barite
- building stone
- chalk
- china clay (kaolin)
- clay and shale
- construction aggregate
- fluorspar (fluorite)
- gypsum
- industrial limestone and dolostone (dolomite)
- polyhalite and potash
- salt (halite)
- sand and gravel
- slate
- talc
Mineral planning factsheets
Mineral planning factsheets are available for most of these UK industrial mineral commodities, covering:
- demand, supply, trade and consumption
- economic importance
- structure of the industry
- raw materials
- reserves and resources
- relationship to environmental designations
- extraction and processing
- by-products
- alternatives and recycling
- effect of economic instruments
- planning issues
In addition, there is a mineral commodity profile for fluorspar and a factsheet on the potential for graphite in the UK. Other industrial mineral reports and maps are avilable to download.
Industrial mineral mines and quarries
The Directory of Mines and Quarries contains details of mines and quarries working industrial minerals in the UK and the UK Minerals Yearbook has statistics for the production of industrial minerals in the UK. BGS’s onshore GeoIndex shows the locations of industrial mineral resource occurrences, planning permissions and operations (both current and historic).
For further information on industrial minerals please contact: Clive Mitchell, BGS Industrial Minerals Geologist.
You may also be interested in
Directory of Mines and Quarries
The Directory of Mines and Quarries (DMQ) contains information on operational mineral sites in the UK during the period 2019 to 2020.
Coal
BGS information and maps on UK coal resources.
Industrial Mineral Assessment Unit (IMAU) reports and maps
IMAU survey reports on British sand and gravel, and other industrial mineral resources.
Construction minerals
Construction minerals include a wide range of materials including brick clay, building stone, construction aggregate, sand and gravel, gypsum, lime and cement raw materials.