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Platinum group metals
united Kingdom summary 2000–2004
Commodity 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004
Tonnes £ thousand
Platinum group metals
Imports
Scrap 593 729 776 367 589 347 219 329 986 115 886 170 533 154 153
Unwrought or partly worked–
Platinum 36 18 10 14 48 284 668 188 045 106 075 169 110 358 887
Palladium 34 20 16 48 25 331 739 257 947 80 100 245 258 98 899
Other platinum group 10 6 4 9 8 147 893 90 525 38 840 30 306 67 054
Exports
Scrap 1 156 1 124 914 1 863 2 681 47 972 37 493 15 535 13 676 18 989
Unwrought or partly worked–
Platinum 32 32 44 37 44 387 533 436 159 448 364 447 735 610 972
Palladium 17 23 18 28 61 218 961 339 248 148 069 117 277 286 892
Other platinum group 8 6 5 10 12 128 442 115 558 47 105 51 748 126 368
Potash
Potash is a generic term for a variety of potassium-bearing minerals and refined products. There are many potassium-bearing minerals
but only those that are water-soluble are of significant commercial interest. Sylvine (potassium chloride, KCl) is by far the most important
source of potash worldwide, because of its solubility and high potassium content, and accounts for all the potash produced in the
UK to date. Potassium minerals rarely occur in pure form and the mined material is invariably a physical mixture of salts. Sylvinite is a
mixture of sylvine and halite (salt, NaCl) in varying proportions and this is the material that is mined in the UK. Potassium is one of the
three primary nutrients essential for plant growth (the others being nitrogen and phosphorus). These nutrients form the basis of fertiliser
production in the UK and throughout the world. About 90 per cent of UK potash production is consumed in the manufacture of fertilisers,
with the remainder in a range of industrial applications.
There is only one source of potash in the UK, the Boulby mine in the North York Moors National Park. Production of potash is thought to
have declined in 2005, to an estimated 800 000 tonnes KCl, a large proportion of which was exported through the company’s deepwater
terminal on the River Tees. This compares with production of 912 000 tonnes KCl in 2004. Rock salt production was 0.60 million tonnes
in 2004. Salt is mined from the arterial roadways in the underlying Boulby Halite to maintain access to current potash mining areas and
to explore and develop new areas for potash production.
Boulby Mine is operated by Cleveland Potash Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Israel Chemicals Ltd. The parent company is the second
largest potash producer in Europe and the fifth largest in the world with a total output of some five million tonnes per year.
The Boulby mine employs some 800 people and is the single most important non-hydrocarbon mineral operation in Britain generating
total sales approaching £100 million in 2004, including by-product rock salt. The workings extend some 14 km, reaching 5 km offshore to
the north where they are approximately 750 m below the sea bed. In the south, a combination of seam dip and topographic relief takes
the workings to more than 1300 m below the land surface.
The potash ore is a mixture of sodium and potassium chloride crystals with occasional inclusions of insoluble material, usually clays.
Returning the insoluble waste material (mainly clay) into disused mine workings was started in 2003 thereby reducing discharges into
the North Sea. Infrastructure and development work for the project was part funded by a European Commission grant.
united Kingdom summary 2000–2004
Commodity 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004
Tonnes £ thousand
Potassium compounds
Indigenous production
KCl product 966 000 882 000 900 000 1 040 000 912 000
Apparent consumption (a)
Potassic fertilisers
(K 2O content) 404 100 393 800 339 100 388 400 392 900
Imports
Crude natural salts 18 050 16 154 19 366 12 751 9 204 1 235 1 053 1 141 661 400
Chloride 255 572 335 398 372 031 246 164 207 056 24 824 26 679 19 462 22 023 20 808
Sulphate 10 514 14 243 8 159 3 765 11 742 1 669 2 145 1 676 1 152 1 933
Other potassic fertilisers 376 263 645 1 674 641 199 215 223 343 413
Exports
Crude natural salts 23 91 26 48 11 58 36 9 71 59
Chloride (b) 630 000 530 000 440 000 630 000 512 000 ... ... ... ... ...
Sulphate 1 036 264 283 153 21 318 73 102 82 12
Other potassic fertilisers 107 877 457 456 641 326 360 497 395 396
(a) Home deliveries plus imports. (b) BGS estimate.
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