Mining Association of the United Kingdom
Encyclopedia
The Mining Association of the United Kingdom is a trade association
Trade association
A trade association, also known as an industry trade group, business association or sector association, is an organization founded and funded by businesses that operate in a specific industry...

 for all kinds of mining undertaken by UK companies.

Function

It promotes and fosters the interests of the metals and mining industry in any part of the world and the corporations, companies, firms and persons engaged or interested in the industry or in industries ancillary to or allied with the metals and minerals industry.

Its members include all the major industrial mineral mining operators in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

. Its work is concentrated on representing its member’s interest at Government and Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an level on environmental and health & safety issues. It is actively involved in lobbying and consulting on proposed legislation.

It is an active member of Euromines
Euromines
The European Association of Mining Industries, Metal Ores & Industrial Minerals was founded in 1996 to represent several national mining associations mainly from Western Europe...

 (the European Mining Federation) and values the access and links to European Commission
European Commission
The European Commission is the executive body of the European Union. The body is responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the Union's treaties and the general day-to-day running of the Union....

 legislative procedures, which this brings. The majority of new legislation which has impact on the mining sector originates in Brussels. Therefore the Association is committed to participating in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

.

It represents the commercial interest of the UK's mining industry outside of coal mining, and includes industries mining:
  • Potash
    Potash
    Potash is the common name for various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water-soluble form. In some rare cases, potash can be formed with traces of organic materials such as plant remains, and this was the major historical source for it before the industrial era...

     (potassium carbonate
    Potassium carbonate
    Potassium carbonate is a white salt, soluble in water , which forms a strongly alkaline solution. It can be made as the product of potassium hydroxide's absorbent reaction with carbon dioxide. It is deliquescent, often appearing a damp or wet solid...

    )
  • Salt
  • Sylvinite
    Sylvinite
    Sylvinite is the most important ore for the production of potash in North America. It is a mechanical mixture of sylvite and halite . Most Canadian operations mine sylvinite with proportions of about 31% KCl and 66% NaCl with the balance being insoluble clays, anhydrite and in some locations...

     - a mixture of sylvite
    Sylvite
    Sylvite is potassium chloride in natural mineral form. It forms crystals in the isometric system very similar to normal rock salt, halite . The two are, in fact, isomorphous. Sylvite is colorless to white with shades of yellow and red due to inclusions. It has a Mohs hardness of 2.5 and a specific...

     (potassium chloride
    Potassium chloride
    The chemical compound potassium chloride is a metal halide salt composed of potassium and chlorine. In its pure state, it is odorless and has a white or colorless vitreous crystal appearance, with a crystal structure that cleaves easily in three directions. Potassium chloride crystals are...

    ) and halite
    Halite
    Halite , commonly known as rock salt, is the mineral form of sodium chloride . Halite forms isometric crystals. The mineral is typically colorless or white, but may also be light blue, dark blue, purple, pink, red, orange, yellow or gray depending on the amount and type of impurities...

     (commonly known as rock salt - sodium chloride
    Sodium chloride
    Sodium chloride, also known as salt, common salt, table salt or halite, is an inorganic compound with the formula NaCl. Sodium chloride is the salt most responsible for the salinity of the ocean and of the extracellular fluid of many multicellular organisms...

    )
  • Gypsum (calcium sulphate
    Calcium sulfate
    Calcium sulfate is a common laboratory and industrial chemical. In the form of γ-anhydrite , it is used as a desiccant. It is also used as a coagulant in products like tofu. In the natural state, unrefined calcium sulfate is a translucent, crystalline white rock...

    ) - used for plaster
    Plaster
    Plaster is a building material used for coating walls and ceilings. Plaster starts as a dry powder similar to mortar or cement and like those materials it is mixed with water to form a paste which liberates heat and then hardens. Unlike mortar and cement, plaster remains quite soft after setting,...

  • Fluorspar - also known as fluorite
    Fluorite
    Fluorite is a halide mineral composed of calcium fluoride, CaF2. It is an isometric mineral with a cubic habit, though octahedral and more complex isometric forms are not uncommon...

     (calcium fluoride
    Calcium fluoride
    Calcium fluoride is the inorganic compound with the formula CaF2. This ionic compound of calcium and fluorine occurs naturally as the mineral fluorite . It is the source of most of the world's fluorine. This insoluble solid adopts a cubic structure wherein calcium is coordinated to eight fluoride...

    )
  • Barytes (barium sulphate
    Barium sulfate
    Barium sulfate is the inorganic compound with the chemical formula BaSO4. It is a white crystalline solid that is odorless and insoluble in water. It occurs as the mineral barite, which is the main commercial source of barium and materials prepared from it...

    )

Formation

It was founded in August 1946 under the name of British Overseas Mining Association.
The founding members were:
  • New Consolidated Gold Fields Ltd
  • Johannesburg Consolidated Investment Co Ltd
  • Mining Trust Ltd
  • Rio Tinto
    Rio Tinto Group
    The Rio Tinto Group is a diversified, British-Australian, multinational mining and resources group with headquarters in London and Melbourne. The company was founded in 1873, when a multinational consortium of investors purchased a mine complex on the Rio Tinto river, in Huelva, Spain from the...

     Co Ltd
  • Union Corporation Ltd
  • General Mining and Finance Corporation Ltd
  • Mason and Berry Ltd


The issues which the Association dealt with on behalf of this original group were mainly taxation issues.

Name change

In 1966 this name was changed to Overseas Mining Association and in 1976 the name was changed to its present style when it merged with the United Kingdom Metal Mining Association.

Current members

  • Anglesey Mining plc
    Anglo American plc
    Cleveland Potash Limited
    British Gypsum Limited
    BPB plc
    BPB plc is a British building materials business: it is the world's largest manufacturer of plasterboard. It once was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index...

    Glebe Mines Limited
    Inco Europe Limited
    Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining
    Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining
    The Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining is a major UK engineering institution whose activities encompass the whole materials cycle, from exploration and extraction, through characterisation, processing, forming, finishing and application, to product recycling and land reuse...

    Irish Salt Mining and Exploration Co. Limited
    Rio Tinto plc
    Salt Union Limited
    United Kingdom Nirex
    NIREX
    Nirex was a United Kingdom body set up in 1982 by the UK nuclear industry to examine safe, environmental and economic aspects of deep geological disposal of intermediate-level and low-level radioactive waste....

     Limited
    Wardell Armstrong
    IMC Group
    Camborne School of Mines
    Camborne School of Mines
    The Camborne School of Mines , commonly abbreviated to CSM, was founded in 1888. It is now a specialist department of the University of Exeter. Its research and teaching is related to the understanding and management of the Earth's natural processes, resources and the environment...

    , University of Exeter
    University of Exeter
    The University of Exeter is a public university in South West England. It belongs to the 1994 Group, an association of 19 of the United Kingdom's smaller research-intensive universities....

    National Coal Mining Museum for England
    National Coal Mining Museum for England
    The National Coal Mining Museum for England is based at the site of Caphouse Colliery in Overton, near Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England. It opened in 1988 as the Yorkshire Mining Museum and was granted national status in 1995.-History:...


External links

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