Live webcast on geology events & the geologic profession in Arizona

AZGS will webcast the AIPG Arizona Chapter's annual review of geology events and the geologic profession in Arizona, this Sat., Feb. 14 from 9 am - 12 noon.

The meeting is being held at the AZGS offices in Tucson and will feature brief presentations by many of the professional societies and geo agencies and organizations in Arizona.

Tune into http://azgs.az.gov/aipg09.shtml and catch up on what's happening in the geosciences in Arizona.

A great day for science

Today is the 200th anniversary of the births of Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin. You can hardly pick up a magazine or open a Web page without finding an analysis of the impacts of Darwin's work on modern society. And rightly so. But Lincoln's contribution to the prominence of American science is not as well known.

In 1863, in the depths of the Civil War, Lincoln established the National Academy of Science. The Act of Incorporation, signed by President Lincoln on March 3, 1863, established service to the nation as its dominant purpose. The act also named 50 charter members, including prominent geologists Louis Agassiz and James Hall, among others. [painting credit, NAS]

So, happy birthday Abe and Charles! And many thanks.

Arizona Water Institute closing due to budget cuts

The state's budget crisis will result in the Arizona Water Institute closing by June 30. In a message to the AWI's external advisory board, Director Kathy Jacobs advised that "some of the projects that were approved for this year will move forward, but most will not - and all of the funding from this fiscal year that remains will be returned to help make up the deficit."

AWI quickly gained widespread attention and recognition for it's unique approach to issues tying together water management, citizen education, and the state economy. AWI has over 100 over 100 project partnerships with public and private sector interests. They just recently posted a series of two-page fact sheets on completed projects.

One of the most innovative steps AWI took was to have associate directors at each of the state's universities as well as embedded in two state agencies - ADEQ and ADWR. I think this had the potential to be one of the most effective water coordination practices done in a state government.

We assemble our first mammoth

We assembled most of a Siberian mammoth today, in the atrium of the main state office building, adjacent to the AZGS offices. The mammoth was excavated in Siberia by the Natural History Museum in Novosibirsk and is on loan to AZGS. Eventually, it's expected to find a permanent home in a museum somewhere in the world.

This was the first time I've seen how the pieces come together. Museum Director Igor Grebnev and Deputy Director Oleg Medvedev snapped and bolted bones together and slipped ball sockets into hip sockets like seasoned pros.

The biggest challenge was getting 6 giant crates loaded by hand onto a truck, followed by mounting the skull onto the vertebral column and post. I'm aching already.

We had a constant stream of passersby who marveled as we did, with the speed and simplicity of the assembly. There were more than enough quips about Legos, tinkertoys, and erector sets.

Tomorrow, after a few repairs to some pieces that got banged around in shipping, we should finish inserting all the ribs, and top it off with installing the tusks.

When I asked how they would make one small repair, the answer was "bondo."

Arizona #1 for metal mining jobs

Arizona was #1 in metals mining jobs in 2007 and in the top 5 for all types of mining jobs, according to a new economic report commissioned by the National Mining Association.

The study also found that mining jobs on average pay $59,000 per year, which is 33% above the combined average salary for all industrial categories. In Arizona, the pay is $60,000, which is 44% higher than the average pay in the state.

The mining industry:

• Produced $98.4 billion of finished mineral, metal and fuel products, which were transformed into an additional $1.8 trillion in value added by other mineral, metal and coal consuming industries [right, from the report, based on data from USGS and DOE-EIA]
  
• Employed 376,310 workers in the 50 states
• Payroll was $22.1 billion
• Paid $4.4 billion in taxes on production and imports, which includes severance taxes, royalties, fees, property taxes and gross receipts taxes, etc., in 2006, the latest data available
• Paid $1.2 billion in federal royalties and other mineral revenues
• Paid $1.2 billion in federal corporate income taxes in 2005, according to the latest data available from the IRS

The metals mining industry, lead by Arizona, produced $25.1 billion of product in 2007, and employed more than 49,000 miners, including contractors. The study found that each job in the metal mining industry generates an additional 4.1 jobs elsewhere in the economy – a total of 5.1 jobs including the metal miners themselves. Thus, a total of 248,380 jobs were generated by U.S. metal mining. The jobs supported by the metal mining industry generated $12.5 billion in payroll (wages and salaries, including overtime and vacation/sick pay) and $4.2 billion in personal income and payroll taxes. So, the loss of 3,000 copper mining jobs in Arizona in recent months means more than 12,000 related jobs are being lost elsewhere along the chain, although not necessarily all in Arizona.

I’m reproducing the complete description of the mining in Arizona section here:

Mining in Arizona, 2007
The State of Arizona, home to 411 mining operations, provided direct employment to 18,480 people and another 34,360 people indirectly from mining activity occurring both in and outside the state for a total of 52,840 jobs statewide.

Mining jobs in Arizona are high paying – 44 percent higher than the average wage in the state. The average annual wage in the mining industry in Arizona was $60,000 in 2007. Total direct earnings from the State of Arizona’s mining payroll were $1,110 million. Including earnings from indirect economic activity from the mining industry in Arizona and elsewhere, a total of $2,520 million was earned by workers in Arizona. Income and payroll taxes from Arizona payrolls, including federal, state and local, and FICA totaled nearly $824 million.

Arizona mining operations created $7,600 million worth of mineral, metal and fuel products. The economic activity indirectly generated by the mining industry in Arizona and other states generated an additional $4,110 million in output from suppliers and other industries in Arizona. In total, $11,710 million in output was generated in Arizona by the mining industry.

American mining produces the critical raw materials necessary to the foundation of our economy. From the minerals and materials used in housing, automobiles and computers, to the mined coal and uranium that generates more than half our nation’s electricity.

Mining in the State of Arizona generates 1.6 percent of the state’s GDP.

Mohave County supervisors endorse uranium exploration, mining

Supervisors in Mohave County voted to support uranium mining in the Arizona Strip because it creates jobs, provides critical fuel for nuclear power plants, and will not affect the local groundwater aquifers or threaten the Grand Canyon as mining opponents claim, according to a report in the Mohave Daily News.

[right, upper figure is the Pigeon Mine during production, November 1989. The mine was located on the north side of Snake Gulch. Lower figure is the Pigeon Mine after reclamation, October 5, 1993. Credit, Natural Resources Impact]

Meteorites on sale

There are a lot of vendors selling meteorites at the Tucson gem and mineral show here. Specimens are generally sold by the gram, with $1/gm the typical price. Big pieces ranging 100 pounds or more, are individually priced. The Argentinian one at right is priced at $8,000

I picked up a big chunk of Nantan meteorite (landed in China in 1516) and pieces of heavily weathered rust fell off on the ground. Which is why that is only going for $16 per pound.

Most are well documented as to their location and mineralogy and collectors are typically seeking specific sites. But some vendors just have boxes or bins marked 'meteorites,' for the buyer looking for something novel.

Arizona stone quarries

We've just learned about the Quarries and Beyond web site that has the most extensive materials on stone quarries for each of the states we've seen. The unnamed stone quarry at right is from their Arizona page. This is an awesome resource.

Thanks to David at Stories in Stone for sharing this.

Salt cavern plan for natural gas storage is cancelled

El Paso Natural Gas is canceling plans to create caverns in underground salt deposits near Eloy in Pinal County to store natural gas to meet peak demands from Phoenix and Tucson.

The company blamed the falling economy and state regulations that prevent them from disposing of the dissolved salt brine in deep saline aquifers, even if the injected water is fresher than the aquifer brine. That makes the cost of creating the salt caverns prohibitively expensive. [right, diagram of a salt cavern used in waste storage. Credit, Salt Cavern Information Center]

Ironically, the state House is holding a hearing in the morning on House Bill 2352, which would exempt natural gas storage wells from state aquifer protection permit requirements but would keep them subject to EPA rules under the safe drinking water act. Under EPA rules, the wells could inject the solution mining waters into saline aquifers.

Asarco - Sterlite deal rumored

Bloomberg reports that Asarco has come to agreement to sell itself to India's Sterlite Industries for a price below the original offer of $2.6 billion. Asarco's parent company Grupo Mexico apparently said the company is only worth $200 million now because of falling copper prices. A deal may be signed within 2 weeks, although Grupo warns creditors may only receive pennies on the dollar of what they're owed. [right, Mission Mine, Arizona. Credit, Asarco Mineral Discovery Center]

Some of the biggest liabilities are environmental and asbestos-related. The original Sterlite offer would have given them $2.1 billion. There are no dollar figures on what the new deal will bring.

Science Foundation Arizona funding embroiled in politics

In the early morning hours on Saturday, the Arizona Legislature eliminated the entire budget of $22 million for the 21st Century Fund which is the pathway to finance Science Foundation Arizona. According to a series of stories in Arizona Guardian, House and Senate leadership had agreed on a lesser cut, and were debating levels of either $7 or $15 million, but a group of freshmen legislators led by Rep. Sam Crump of Anthem, led a 'rebellion' and pushed through the complete elimination of funds.

Then on Monday, House Speaker Kirk Adams stripped Crump of his chairmanship of the House Government Committee, for leading the so-called 'uprising' against the party leadership.

After two days of press releases and conferences, and closed meetings, Adams today reinstated Crump to his committee chair position. But Science Foundation Arizona funding is gone, begging the question why it became the victim of such a prominent political battle. Many of the newspaper articles that covered the budget battles described SFA as one of former Governor Napolitano's pet projects, but I can't say how much of a factor that was.

Global competition for natural resources

The growing demands by rapidly industrializing nations, especially China and India, for energy and raw materials is causing more pressure to develop local resources in the US, and leading to potential conflicts with multinational corporations operating here. That's the assessment of Vince Matthews, State Geologist of Colorado, who spoke to the Arizona Geological Society in Tucson last night.

Vince pounded home his message with massive amounts of facts, figures, and statistics, fused with his own insights from a long and varied career in government, industry, and academia.

The bottom line is that we will need all of our energy resources, including traditional fossil and nuclear, renewables, and conservation, as well as unconventional sources, to meet society's demands for many years to come.

Once the world economy starts to recover, he warns that we will see inflation and shortages of raw and critical minerals to resume. While China in particular has national strategic efforts to secure mineral resources around the world, and the companies that control or produce them, the US has largely ignored this whole subject. Vince referenced a recent National Academy study (Dec 08) that called the Defense Strategic Stockpile program ineffective and warned that the nation is clueless about the consequences. A sobering talk but convincingly told.

Asraco will demolish El Paso smelter

Word just out that Asarco will not reopen their El Paso copper smelter [right, credit Sierra Club] and in fact, will demolish it and clean up the site.

The plant has been temporarily shut down since 1999 but Asarco has been waging an aggressive public relations campaign about reopening it, arguing it would have created 300 hourly jobs and 80 salaried positions. But the economic downturn and dramatic drop in copper prices seem to have trumped that. Environmentalists have been opposing the smelter for years.

Rail line could be part of Resolution Copper land exchange

A proposal has come forward to include a Magma Arizona Railroad line as part of the land swap bill in Congress for the Resolution Copper mine near Superior. Her proposal is to add the rail line to the Southeast Arizona Land Exchange and Conservation Act that would trade 5,500 acres of conservation lands for lands Resolution needs to develop its mine. [right, Magma engine #10, at the Arizona Railroad Museum]

State Representative Barbara McGuire wants the existing line now owned by Resolution to become a passenger line connecting the Superior area to the Phoenix Valley and eventually to the new light rail line. According to a story in the Arizona Republic, McGuire also wants to get federal transportation stimulus money to help convert the line.

The rail line was built to transport cattle and copper to the SP line in Magma.

World's largest fossil oyster and more from Tucson fossil show

The seller says that at 52 inches across, this is the world's largest fossil oyster [right]. It's from the Cretaceous Niobrara Fm. in Gove Co., Kansas. The flyer says these oysters were unusually thin, which allowed them to 'float' along the sediment surface of the ancient sea.

The Fossil Hall at the Inn & Suites hotel two blocks from the AZGS building is one of the more spectacular venues of big and exotic fossils. I ran down during lunch and, as usual, was blown over by what's for sale. The dinosaur skull on the lower right has a 'sold' sign on it, as did a number of other showy pieces including a beautiful mammoth tusk.

Chromium petrified wood from Arizona

This piece of green petrified wood from Winslow Arizona caught my attention at the gem show. The vendor, from Kingman, said it's the result of chromium infusion in the agatization process. He said it comes from an extremely small occurrence on the Navajo Reservation, and fetches premium prices. The piece pictured was listed at $175.

Pleistocene wooly rhino from Siberia

This Pleistocene wooly rhino is from the Siberian Natural History Museum in Novosibirsk. Pictured with it are Oleg Medvedev and Igor Gebnev, who are selling it and a complete mammoth, along with other fossils, to raise funds to support the museum's research and operations.

Their tent is set up at the Ramada Inn mineral and fossil show just west of downtown Tucson.

Oleg says there only two complete intact wooly rhinos on display in the world, both in former Soviet republics. Theirs is a composite of bones from a few different animals. It can be yours for only $50,000. It's mostly other museums that are the customers for these fossils.

Petrified wood art and furniture

One of the more striking pieces I spotted at the Tucson gem and mineral shows today is this conference table [right] made of a single slab of Arizona petrified wood.

Ralph Thompson with Russell-Zuhl Petrified Wood in Massachusetts, polishes slabs all year as art pieces and furniture and displays them only at the Tucson show.

I did not ask prices.

Into the belly of the Biosphere

About 10 pm last night, a line from the "Gilligan Island's" theme song started running through my head - something about "a three hour tour."

We were deep in the subterranean levels of Biosphere 2, ducking our heads to enter a low triangular- shaped tunnel into one of two giant 'lungs.' The lungs are huge circular underground chambers, sealed with rubber-like bellows that allow the whole complex to breathe and prevent the Biosphere from exploding or imploding as air pressures change with the changing temperatures.

A group of us were getting the special tour following an all-day meeting of the UA-run iPlant Collaborative education, outreach, and training planning group. We had a wonderful dinner in the former rec room where the biospherians gathered during their infamous 2-year isolation experiment. [left, the sign says, "Lower Savanna Basement" and identifies water pipes under that environment in the overlying Biosphere]

Much of our tour was underneath the floor of the giant iconic glass structure. That also allowed us to walk the beach of the ocean lagoon, which is not open to the public, as well as seeing the incredibly complex guts of the operation.

Groundwater mining caused 3,000 square miles of subsidence in Arizona

More than 3,000 square miles of Arizona has subsided, due to groundwater pumping, including an area of 100 square miles in Pinal County between Phoenix and Tucson that sank 7 feet between 1952 and 1977, according to testimony by Arizona water chief Herb Guenther in testimony last week.

Herb raised concerns that the 100 year assured supplies of water are based on allowing groundwater mining down to 1,000 feet, but what happens then? How do you replace the water and how do you deal with the resulting subsidence?

[right, active subsidence areas in Arizona, based on ADWR InSAR]