.

Wally Griffitts Shared freely his immense knowledge and experience regarding beryllium, in particular, and geology, in general.

Lee Rice generated shaded‑relief maps of South Park and freely shared his knowledge of data bases and sources.

Douglas C. Peters freely shared his knowledge of data bases, people with expertise and his personal research.

MILS (USBOM), MRDS (USGS), NURE (USDOE) and CGS‑compiled data bases (especially the Mined‑Lands Reclamation group) provided ready information about prospective areas and mineral history not otherwise reasonably obtainable.

The paternal ancestors of Lindsey V. Maness, Jr. provided anecdotal insight into some of the mining techniques of the 19^th and early 20^th Centuries that approached "No‑Waste Mining" in philosophy. In particular, my Uncles Buck and Martin, my Great‑Uncle George, my Grandmother and my Father made contributions without their realizing it at the time.

Mining Lode & Tunnel Claims, 1872 Law

Filed by Mining Attorney John Stewart in 2002

Name of Claim: Wally & Mary Griffitts Lode Claim, CMC‑252129

Name of Claim: Wally & Mary Griffitts Tunnel Claim, CMC‑252130

Claimant: Lindsey V. Maness, Jr.

Location: in Pike National Forest, Park County, Colorado

Previous Informal Name of Claim area: "China Wall Mines"

With nearby Boomer Mine, largest producer of beryllium ore in US during 1950s‑1960s.

Mineralized Contact of Pikes Peak Granite & Redskin Granite

Primary Area of Interest: Vuggy Beryllium Pipe (Greisen)

Secondary Area of Interest: Pegmatite Dikes & Contact Mineralization (Greisen)

Filing Locations

• Federal


• Bureau of Land Management


Bureau of Land Management
2850 Youngfield Street
Lakewood, CO 80215
Tel: 303‑239‑3791

Bureau of Land Management
Royal Gorge Field Office
3170 East Main Street
Canon City, CO 81212
Tel: 719‑269‑8500


• Pike National Forest

Note: The BLM Canon City Office is in charge of mining claims in the Park County portion of Pike National Forest.

• State


• Colorado Geological Survey (Mined Lands Reclamation)


• County


• Park County

Primary Commodities: Gem‑Quality

• Aquamarine (& other Beryls)
• Topaz &
• Amazonite

Previous Mining:

• Beryl Ore (combined with Boomer Mine production)
• Argentiferous Galena (>200 oz. of Ag/ton) Podiform
• Auriferous Pyrite (Au)
• Tungsten (Wolframite, Scheelite, ...)
• Molybdenum (Molybdenite, Powellite [scheelite with Mo substitution for W])

Also Present (for Future Mining):

• Beryllium Minerals as ore: (Beryl, Bertrandite, Chrysoberyl, phenakite, etc.)
• Niobium & Tantalum (in Columbite)
• Fluorite
• Tin (Cassiterite)
• Lithium (Lepidolite)
• Copper (Chalcopyrite & various disseminated minerals)
• Zinc (Sphalerite, probably with Gallium measures)
• Clays (both Primary & processing‑generated). Clays will almost certainly be the single most troublesome of the products produced in No‑Waste Mining. Most of the clay produced will be a result of reactions between the various prolific micas and the biologically‑generated sulfuric acid. Other than difficulty in marketing at a profit, clays, per se, are notorious for their being scavengers of metallic ions, most of which are desired to be recovered for their economic value. Clays include:
• Kaolinite
• Illite
• Montmorillonite
• Dickite, etc.
• Stones (to boulder size) that have gone through processing intact may be marketed as themselves, or as cut blocks or slabs. This will be an important part of both volume and weight reduction in No‑Waste Mining.
• Rhodochrosite, Siderite & Manganosiderite (coats fractures). Rhodochrosite and siderite are in the calcite family of crystals and can be considered to be different (manganese and iron, respectively) end‑members, with manganosiderite being mixes of intermediate composition. Thin partings of very high‑quality bright, reddish‑orange rhodochrosite crystals occur in fractures in quartz near the eastern edge of the claim, within the area formerly mined for auriferous pyrite. It is quite likely that gem‑quality rhodochrosite crystals will be found in vugs within the claim area.
• Potassium Feldspar (many markets)
• Sodic Plagioclase (Inert: probable end‑uses will be in concrete blocks and for use as road fill.)
• Garnets (Abrasives: too small for gemstones.)
• Corundum (The numerous large clots of biotite mean there is a significant potential for large gem‑quality corundum [Rubies & Sapphires] — that would be liberated by sulfuric acid digestion.)
• Mineral Specimens for Collectors
• Quartz & other Crystals
• Large mica books
• Biotite
• Muscovite
• Lepidolite. Small pinkish books of lepidolite are quite common and can be considered an indicator mineral for beryl.
• Amazonite
• Micro‑mounts of rare & beautiful minerals
• A distinct possibility exists for deriving limited vanadium, cobalt and nickel from the concentrates remaining after processing for major constituents is completed.
• Uraninite in minor quantities is reported as occurring in the form of black, dusty fracture fillings, with, occasionally, minor alterations on oxidized surfaces to carnotite, a bright, canary‑yellow uranium mineral.

The first and foremost goal is to utilize all that is mined. When mining is completed, ideally, there should be no remaining mine dumps, tailings piles, etc. No residual legal or environmental liabilities would have been created by mining. The social good of having produced large amounts of materials useful for society would have been obvious.

The Summitville Mine is a prime example of the consequence of extracting only a single commodity (Au) from a mine site. Had Summitville been a "No‑Waste Mine," additional valuable commodities would have been produced:

• Copper
• Nickel
• Silver
• Clays,
• Stones, etc.

Further, liabilities would have been eliminated or limited to the pre‑existing natural background and future costs minimized:

• Acid mine drainage
• Heavy Metals pollution
• Erosion (of fine clays, in particular)
• Regrading and stabilizing mine dumps, tailings, etc.

In practical terms, No‑Waste Mining aims to accomplish:

• Reduction in Volume
• Reduction in Mass
• Profit (or at least break‑even) on commodities

When mining is completed, the end use should be things of far greater value to humanity such as:

• Lakes, ponds & water storage
• Secure storage areas
• Growing site (e.g., for mushrooms, etc.)
• Secure biological research facilities
• Control lights, temperature, humidity, etc.
• Control introduction (& egress) of organisms
• Control gas, pesticide, etc., composition

"One man's trash is another man's treasure." lvm. All of us know true stories about people who made fortunes by changing the commodities mined and those declared gangue from specific mines. No‑Waste Mining takes this a step further, by attempting to produce useful products from everything that is removed from the earth in a mining operation.

"What is removed is no longer there." lvm. What is not there will not be present in the future to contaminate the land, air and water. (e.g., Pb & other heavy metals) Regulations and laws that are misinterpreted to inhibit or prevent removal and reasonable use are counter‑productive.

"What we produce ourselves, we do not have to buy from others." lvm. Production of American products:

• Benefits the national (and local) balance‑of‑payments.
• Creates jobs, both immediate and consequential.
• Strategic necessity for the USA. Strategic minerals!

"Waste not, want not." Benjamin Franklin.

"Local jobs are always popular." lvm.

"An improved tax base is always popular." lvm.

"No matter what you do, or how you do it, the environmentalists will always criticize it and you." lvm. Not everybody is rational or reasonable. One simply cannot converse meaningfully with those whose actual goal is to eliminate all of humanity from nature. (Except for themselves, of course!) Still, we should not allow irrational objections to prevent us from providing needed raw materials to our modern society.

The processing of materials to extract one commodity minimize the costs necessary to extract additional commodities. lvm. Costs that have already been incurred do not have to be paid again for other materials. For example, the costs incurred in crushing rock to extract gold do not have to be paid again to crush the same rock to extract copper and silver: the crushing has already been accomplished.

The removal of a mineral in a mix increases the percentage of the residual minerals. lvm. For example, if one starts with an equal mix of potassium feldspar, sodic plagioclase and quartz (33‑1/3% each) and removes the sodic plagioclase, the new percentages are 50 percent for each of the K‑spar and the quartz. In like manner, if one separates the one percent of heavies from a mix, each of the percentages of the heavies will increase accordingly (i.e., ~99x). This dramatic increase in concentration is a large justification for No‑Waste Mining.

These are some of the ways to separate minerals based upon their physical, chemical and other properties. The use of the word "Mining" herein is in the "vertically‑integrated business" sense.

• Hand‑cobbing (indispensable, especially for gems)
• Size (the single most important method used in separating and beneficiating ores)
• Many minerals in a deposit are of characteristic size.
• Minerals differ in their brittleness/ease of crushing, often leading to direct separation of ores, based solely on size. Also, it should be noted that minerals are often more‑or‑less evenly distributed within a limited size distribution, which can lead to ready separation based upon crystal size, alone.
• Many techniques work better with well‑sorted materials.
• Traditional low‑cost procedures, from ancient arrastres to modern‑day ball mills & grizzlies.
• Cyclones and Centrifuges are two of the more sophisticated and effective methods for beneficiating ores based upon their relative sizes and densities.
• Many effective procedures are based upon sorting by moving fluids, especially wind and water.
• Smelting is the traditional means of treating ores, especially sulfides, to release metals. Smelting usually pollutes the air, water and land while wasting much that is of value. Smelting is being replaced for most uses by new biological heap‑leaching methods, which are still evolving.
• Biological Heap‑Leaching & Shaft Heap‑Leaching: Sulfur‑eating bacteria oxidize metal sulfides and generate sulfuric acid, which acts as a leachate to carry metals in solution out of the heap where they can be readily recovered. A reasonable new approach is to use existing or specially‑constructed mine shafts for biological heap‑leaching to recover metals, etc., missed in previous mining.
• Pressure Pressure can be used to enhance the speed of reactions, to increase solubility, and to cause reactions inside rocks that would not occur without it. Lack of pressure (vacuum) also can have unique advantages.
• Exposure to short wavelength radiation (e.g., UV to X‑Rays).

• Increases rate of reactions. Some chemical reactions occur at greatly increased rates in the presence of UV light.
• Fluorescence. X‑Rays cause fluorescence of diamonds, enabling their ready separation.

• Natural
• Induced

• Solution (selective removal from solids: e.g., Au using a dilute NaCN solution)
• Precipitation (selective removal of solids from liquids). Often combined with filtering.
• Reaction (make new compounds that can be separated)
• Surface Chemistry/Tension (detergent & oil flotation)
• Thermite Reactions (Al powder reacts vigorously with many metal oxides to release the native metal + Al oxides + generation of large amounts of heat. For many high‑temperature metals (e.g., Vanadium), other methods of purification are far less effective and far more expensive.)

• Melting (selective removal from solids)
• Vaporization (selective removal from liquids & solids)
• Crystallization (selective removal from liquids & gases)
• Heat & Quench (abrupt cooling of heated minerals, usually to liberate gold).

• Oxidizing (e.g., U very soluble)
• Reducing (e.g., U very insoluble)

• pH (e.g., solubility and rate of reaction often varies directly with pH.)
• Specific Gravity/Density (e.g., Gold pans & Fe₃O₄ floats)
• Amalgamation Hg readily dissolves gold, enabling its efficient separation from heavy minerals concentrates. Mercury is one of the elements which has been demonized by the politically‑correct and environmentally‑correct.
• Alloying The process of melting metals together can exclude those metals that are non‑miscible, leading to their separation and purification, under certain circumstances. For example, gold can be separated as "buttons" from certain metals with which it is melted, under certain conditions of time, temperature, etc.
• Slagging In the making of many metals (e.g., iron), the non‑desired constituents, with a higher melting temperature and lower specific gravity, can be easily separated from the melt. The opposite is also true, when one values the slag more than the melt. In reality, many desirable constituents usually remain in iron slag (e.g., cobalt) in economically desirable concentrations — but it has not been traditional to process slag further. This is one area in which the "No‑Waste Mining approach" could be effectively applied.
• Steaming (e.g., to liberate diamonds from unoxidized kimberlitic matrix)
• Chromatography (separation by varying speeds of fluid diffusion of different atomic weights of dissolved materials)
• Color (separation based upon reflectance/absorption of radiation)
• Vibration (e.g., Gold spirals)
• Emerald Detector (a beryl detector invented by lvm)

A Trade Secret (Please, no discussion!)
Signed Non‑Compete, Non‑Disclosure: will reveal

With the notable exceptions of Safety & Security, most of these items of concern are of a theoretical, as opposed to a demonstrated reality.

• Safety & Security.
• Safety for all is the paramount concern. Legal liability (attractive nuisance, ...) is a worry, but pales in significance to the possibility of a child getting hurt doing something he shouldn't. And, of course, there are the ignorant and avaricious whose capacity for stupidity cannot be overestimated.
• Security of the physical plant, mine workings, etc., from thieves and vandals (e.g., ELF) will be a constant worry. Rock hounds can do as much damage stealing mineral samples as the most extreme eco‑terrorist — with the exception that rock hounds, per se, will not intentionally take actions to cause injuries or deaths to others. The former does not consider himself a thief: the latter considers himself to be a hero. Both can devastate honest miners.
• Sulfur‑eating bacteria will be used to digest sulfides and liberate H₂SO₄ in a vertical heap‑leach shaft. The result will be metal oxides and sulfuric acid.

The advantages include:

• Metal oxides are far easier to process into native metals than are the equivalent refractory sulfides.
• Biological processing is far less harmful to ambient air quality than the smelting of sulfides.
• The total eventual cost is lower.

The disadvantages include:

• Longer time for biological processing requires financial stamina. There are no quick pay‑outs of project costs.
• A relative loss of control over the chemical processing is a concern. In particular the similarity in properties of Sulfur, Selenium (toxic) and Tellurium (toxic) must be considered, at least theoretically. The final result of the S‑Se‑Te chemistry would be, at least in theory:
• H₂SO₄ primary constituent. Ready market exists.
• H₂SeO₄ generated in ppt. (Stinks profoundly!)
• H₂TeO₄ possibly generated in ppb (or as a trace amount).

• Separating and purifying the sulfuric, selenic and telluric acids each from the other would be desirable, and, possibly, necessary. Even though tellurium compounds are the most toxic in this chemical series, there exists a robust market for Te, in particular in electronics. Selenium is both toxic and of little value.

Further, in like manner, but in smaller direct proportions, would be the theoretical generation of sulfurous acid, selenous acid and tellurius acid:
• H₂SO₃ secondary constituent. Market exists.
• H₂SeO₃ generated in ppm or ppb.
• H₂TeO₃ possibly generated as a trace amount.
• The presence of large quantities of low pH acids over a protracted period of time means that the prolific micas would be very thoroughly converted to clays. The generated clays would interfere with the percolation of water (down) and air (up) through the ore column, and require special steps to be taken throughout the entire process. Ultimately, the purification and marketing of the clays would be a very significant problem.
• Some, but not all, of the Beryllium minerals are quite toxic and can cause berylliosis in the genetically susceptible. Berylliosis is an acute respiratory illness that is usually fatal to those who contract it. In general, the pure metal (probably because its surface reacts quickly to become BeO [beryllia] or Be(OH)₂ [behoite]), the oxide, hydroxide and soluble salts are toxic in approximate direct correlation with their solubility and surface area exposed. There is no evidence for toxicity of the silicates of beryllium, quite the contrary: berylliosis is not reported among cutters of emeralds, chrysoberyl and other gem forms of beryllium minerals. There is an extremely small possibility that beryllia or behoite might be present with the beryl in the Blue Puma Mines, but these have not been observed or reported, probably because these soluble minerals, if ever present, have long since leached away. Of greater theoretical concern is the possibility of generating and leaching BeSO₄ using the biological heap leach method planned. While there is no information available about toxicity of BeSO₄, it is a slightly soluble salt and must be an item of concern. The EPA has recently officially demonized (labelled as a carcinogen) all forms of beryllium, not just those known to be toxic (just as with asbestos, only one of whose varieties has been proven to be carcinogenic). Even though berylliosis is not a form of cancer, it is still legally a carcinogen to the EPA. Insofar as such labelling effectively prevents the separation and beneficiation of beryllium minerals, and its reasonable use, such a designation can actually be a substantial public harm.
• Radioactive Elements:

• U (Easily separated & concentrated) Marketable.
• Th (Separable) Marketable
• Radium (Separable daughter product of U.) Marketable
• Radon (Not separable daughter product of Radium.) Not marketable. 8.8 days half‑life. Known to cause lung cancer in very small doses. Easily vented to acceptable (EPA‑determined) levels.
• All activities regarding radioactive elements, including storage and marketing, are closely regulated by numerous governmental (Federal & State) agencies. While this will be a headache (both Security & otherwise), it is clearly better to extract these elements than to leave them behind in a residual mine dump to pollute in the future.

"Once a substance has been demonized, all rational discourse concerning it becomes outlawed." lvm

• Asbestos (Tremolite, ...). Only one form of asbestiform mineral has been shown to be a carcinogen. The EPA has declared all asbestiform minerals to be carcinogens.
• Pb Lead has been declared "an enemy of the people" by the Politically‑Correct. The real irony is that lead‑based products are, by governmental mandate, being replaced mostly with silver‑based products. Even though silver‑based products are explicitly assumed to be safe, the reality is that silver salts are comparable in toxicity to lead salts. Silver is both more expensive and less desirable for most uses for which lead is ideal.
• Hg Mercury has been declared "an enemy of the people" by the Politically‑Correct.
• NaCN Properly diluted and applied sodium cyanide is without equal for certain uses, in particular for gold mining. Even though NaCN is less harmful to the environment than the alternatives, NaCN has been outlawed in several states.
• As Arsenic has been declared "an enemy of the people" by the Politically‑Correct. Arsenic has many valid uses (e.g., in electronics) for which no suitable alternative exists.
• U, Th, Radium & other radioactive elements have been declared "an enemy of the people" by the Politically‑Correct. It is probably only a matter of time before the ignorant PC‑crowd succeeds in having potassium (a radioactive element that is necessary for life) also demonized.
• Be Beryllium has been declared "an enemy of the people" by the Politically‑Correct. Certain forms of beryllium (in soluble salts ...) cause a truly horrific illness, berylliosis, in the genetically susceptible. All forms of Be have been declared to be carcinogenic by the EPA, even though berylliosis is not a cancer! Beryllium is a strategic element in critically short supply for which no acceptable substitute exists.
• Metallic Na & K has been demonized. As a result of an ongoing lawsuit, a huge amount of metallic sodium was removed from a nuclear facility in Washington state and shipped to Colorado for disposal as hazardous waste. This metallic sodium could have been effectively used in industrial processes; instead, it was reacted with water to make NaOH (a form of lye) and buried in a landfill at a cost to the taxpayer of millions of dollars. That was a terribly expensive waste of a valuable national resource.
• Silica sand has been demonized in industrial processes (but not on beaches!).