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Show REPORT FRO 11 VAHHINGTOM ... Ranking lie'.ibl'c-.u T.-Isnber, Ilcase i.li r.J Mini i;; S .tbcorr mittc o Burinr the Eisenhower Administration the idea of a National MLierals Policy was first considered, but only since the present Administration took office has such a plan received much support. The need for such a policy is obvious to ail who study the prcble:n. A National Minerals Policy is an essential starting poi.-.t in any logical log-ical and progressive search for solutions to our mineral research problem. Exactly what cur rnincval resource problem is I diseased dis-eased in my last report, and ii this re.ocrt I vi'l en-P'ain en-P'ain what a Nt.cv;.-1 KireT.ls Pcl'c vl; d - t h-1 1 irnrf.-.r.t a -id heartening an-! an-! . i:.-.tv.-.K-r.t. A low-cost way, ; , ;ivr.:.1 sir pollution cause :1 - ; : i: 5 ct jmsk. c ; '.c-.-obiL.-. his been devel-..;. devel-..;. u an. t" ai we can . : . li.v.'y destroy ihc-, ihc-, c i -. eutnmobiles and t val -a'j'e mi t 1 ' . .lot c .-ly vvith--! t'c env'roanjent, 1 - ..-:','-!ei!V. v, a ;tin3 our ', v:- i .; --.h :--:el v g sJ- p lor-v.-rtl. br.t r.nich more needs to bo done be Core we can s't b-i k ; : ...i ;a' our country's l -.ineral iesourc:s. Sor one :.i what we are today in-i::ti.iting in-i::ti.iting as true waste, hope- j .villy, Oi;e day soon we can e.is-ccver e.is-ccver how to re-use. A lNiuiior.al ivnnorals Pciiey ,,'ould help our mineral resource re-source development in another extremely important way. 'ith I toco a policy directing us we I can expect to learn more about how to substitute relative' y abundant materials fjr sub-staoces sub-staoces in Ft", u'i '-out '-out sarriiieing ouainy or adcl-irrr adcl-irrr to Hie est of the end Cbvicusly. though, to a?hi:vo su : a . .. . :.s Ww 1 as ?il the oth--- '2".js. '-a'..- ma-'pov.cr must be available. And, sadly, it is not. A member of my staff called the Bureau of nines to ask how many students stu-dents there are in the mineral sciences today and the first answer given was, "I don't know the exact figure, but I can tell you this much: Whatever What-ever the- number is, it isn't nearly large enough.' In Utah, where more thai 200 mine.ais are found, and j whore rr-inii-j is so important to the economy, only 23 students, stu-dents, statewide, earned degrees de-grees in the mineral sciences r'ir i-g the aaadem.ie year 1967-G3. 1967-G3. And all of these students studied at the University of Utah, the orly inst station in the state fa rlr.tc, the area of v. hieh contains probably the greatest variety of minerals in the world for its size) which offers degree programs in this j vifal area. Clta "ly, more schools need to offer such pro- alleviate this j-r. ' ::..-. With a properly directed purpose pur-pose as defined in a national policy we can expect a gradual grad-ual transition to . lawer-arad :. and less accescibla mineral deposits de-posits for our essmUal needs. Today we are mining oaly tha most accessible minerals in such a way as to make it hazardous haz-ardous and extremely costly for us to mine the loss eccas-sible eccas-sible ones in the vicinity. Clearly it is unwise to continue con-tinue on such a course, which is rather like a child's taking an ice cream bar out of toe freezer, eating the chocolate coating, and then leaving the rest on the counter; it's true that the easiest to reach and the best was consumed, but the rest was wasted. America is affluent, but it cannot afford to act affluent much longer. Incidentally, not only must we develop methods of finding find-ing and extracting minerals in the deep layers of the earth's crust, we must also do so from the ocean, a virtually untapped source of mineral wealth. The government's mo:.: recent, efforts concerned with mining have been directed toward mine safety, and th's is an area that rightly deserves a great deal of attention. The Mine Safety Act, signed by Pr's'd?nt TTi--o-. )s'. '"onUi, was a long-awaited rh'c of legislation. Unfori-r.a'-W iho, mine safety is abi't ""e o-'y facet of mining that has received re-ceived attention la(ciy. Oar government should be suppart-ing suppart-ing all kinds of mining rkv 1 cpment tcchi-oloaie?', c"".pl",r atory, educational, etc. not just safety. One of the great outrages is our continuing failure to retard re-tard the flow cf usable materials mater-ials into scrap piles and ta utilize the above-grcard el-lections el-lections more fully to satisfy our requirements. There is rn reason why we cannot make products more durable aed thereby extend the mi-oral resource re-source base of the nation while we salvage every bit we cm from our di-caracd products. A eorx-f-ne'We Hao-ff.-ct of a minerals poii-y that cacaar-ages cacaar-ages the re-use of valuable minerals is the peitive effect it would have on our environment. environ-ment. Our junk yards would became sources of srpply, rather rath-er than areas of envi: on, no ",!al dsgrcdalion. Such a aida-ef e"t is something without which our country cannot safe'y endure en-dure much longer. Just last week in Utah the U. S. Bureau of Mines at its Metallurgy Center made an grams, and more students should be encouraged to enter this challenging field of enormous enor-mous importance. As I indicated in my last report, our country's mineral development is a crne'al problem, prob-lem, but one that can be solved. And, we can expect some exciting bene'icial side-'offects side-'offects of mineral deevclap-ment. deevclap-ment. For instance, development develop-ment of rapid tunneling methods meth-ods would benefit many other aspects of modern life. It could undoubtedly be adapted to building subways in large cities. But most importantly, with a sound minerals policy we could better protect our environment, envir-onment, so seriously threatened by prolonged abuse of many of our natural resource. |