• Bookstore

Over a lifetime, each one of us will consume about 35 lorry-loads of minerals and metals. The average person in the UK uses around 10 tonnes of minerals and metals every year. This includes the minerals needed to build our homes and manufacture all our household possessions, as well as the minerals, metals and fuels used in our industrial, retail, transport, leisure, health and public sectors.

A new web resource has been created by the British Geological Survey (BGS) to provide information to the non-specialist on minerals. The Minerals & You web pages were launched at the Annual International Meeting of the Mineral Deposit Studies Group on 3rd January 2008 at the BGS site in Keyworth, Nottingham.

"Minerals are essential to our modern lifestyle - if it can't be grown, it has to be mined. These pages show that, despite massive increases in recycling, minerals and metals are vital components in our lives, used to make everything from mobile phones and cars to houses and roads" said Andrew Bloodworth, Head of Science for Minerals at the British Geological Survey.

The extraction of minerals inevitably has an impact on the environment. The Minerals & You web pages explain the importance of careful planning of mineral extraction, mine and quarry restoration and the sustainable use of resources, including recycling, reusing, and conserving energy.

Minerals & You also describes what economic minerals are and gives a summary of how mineral deposits are formed and developed for use by all of us. Users can see what a lifetime's supply of minerals and metals looks like and learn why these are so important to all of us.