White Earth Project, Colorado - The largest titanium resource in the United States.

CIM Bulletin, Vol. 91, No. 1022, 1998

K.C. Shaver, KCS Consulting, Westminster, Colorado, United States, and
R.A. Lunceford, Teck Resources Inc., Golden, Colorado, United States

Acquired by Teck Corporation in 1990, the White Earth project, located in southwestern Colorado is the largest titanium resource in the U.S. Teck Corporation has conducted geologic, reserve, mineral processing, pre-marketing, and environmental baseline studies directed toward the economic feasibility of producing titanium pigment. The White Earth project is situated in a 31 km2 alkalic-carbonatite complex intruded into Precambrian granite and metamorphic rocks about 570 million years ago. Perovskite occurs in a 8 km by 1.2 km pyroxenite zone partially delineated by the WNW trending Cimarron fault. High grade mineralization is partly controlled by subtle perovskite cumulate layers and perovskite-magnetite dykes. Mineable proven, probable and possible reserves at Deldorado Ridge are 41.8 million tonnes grading 13.2% TiO2 within an open-ended global proven, probable and possible geologic resource of 1.6 billion tonnes grading 10.9%TiO2.