News
At the Michigan Geological Repository for Repository for Research and Education we share news about upcoming workshops, rock cores recently received, education and research activities, and student and faculty achievements.
January 8, 2025
2025 Update about Michigan's Potash Deposit and our Research
Dr. William Harrison recently described Michigan’s potash deposit and the research we have been conducting about it. The article discusses the history of the deposit, where it is, and why it is particularly important now. He discusses the collection of potash rock cores that we preserve at MGRRE from 77 different wells in 9 counties. Research by MGRRE staff and students identified the geologic and stratigraphic distribution of this deposit, and analytical testing by industry has confirmed it to be the highest grade potash known throughout the world.
November 21, 2024
Dr. Petcovic and her Introduction to Earth Materials class students examined and described cores at MGRRE.
October 17, 2024
Geography Department Student Visitors at MGRRE
- Learned about Lidar mapping from Dr. Robb Gillespie
- Examined Cores
- Heard professional mappers discuss their work
CORE WORKSHOP OCTOBER 3, 2024, AT MGRRE
Unlocking Michigan’s Subsurface Vault
We focused on geological energy storage, carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS), and geological waste disposal.
- Examining Cores
- Hearing about USGS and MSG/MGRRE Research
- Learning from Michigan Experts
- Networking
Workshop Speakers
Adam Wygant, State Geologist, speaks to the group
Ashton Wiens, USGS; Bill Harrison, MGRRE; Matthew Jones, USGS (left TO right) discuss cores
Waste Disposal well core to exam
September 20, 2024
Legacy cuttings and data donation from Ron Budros
Ron Budros was a dedicated geologist in the Michigan oil and gas industry. He was an avid data collector and visited MGRRE often to examine cores and cuttings. Unfortunately, Ron died suddenly in May, 2023.
Ron was a generous donor to MGRRE in his lifetime and now through his estate. At his request, his family donated his collection of well data to MGRRE in September, 2024.
That collection includes cuttings, core chips, oil samples, and photographic images of cores. The cuttings collection alone represents 81 wells, largely from the Trenton/Black River formations.
We will use this collection in our current carbon storage research to better characterize the Trenton and Black River formations.
We have always known that data has more than one life. Ron knew this as well—that’s why he left the collection to MGRRE. This data will be used here in our research, education, and outreach, in ways that we cannot even imagine now. We are honored to archive this legacy collection.
DR. PETER VOICE AND HIS CLASS EXAMINE UPPER PENINSULA CORES AT MGRRE
May 30, 2024 - Dr. Peter Voice and his students examined cores at MGRRE to see examples of rocks they will see next week in the Upper Peninsula. These are some of the oldest cores that we preserve at MGRRE.
MAY 14-15, 2024 CCUS WORKSHOP
We welcomed 40 people from other surveys, universities, governmental agencies and industry to a CCUS core workshop here at MGRRE May 14-15, 2024. More than 3300’ of core was available for examination and the team made several presentations about Michigan’s Carbon Systems. The main focus was on formations that can act as seals (confining systems) for underlying formations that can store CO2. Post-workshop evaluations showed that participants found the workshop to be well presented and useful. We thoroughly enjoyed presenting it.
APRIL 2024 UNIVERSITY STUDENTS EXAMINE AND DESCRIBE CORES AT MGRRE
WMU's Dr. Petcovic (second from right) and Lab Assistant Ashley Scott (far right) welcome WMU earth materials class students to MGRRE
WMU’s Dr. Petcovic brought her earth materials class students to MGRRE to examine and describe cores and cuttings and to discuss why we archive samples from natural resources MGRRE.
Albion College Dr. Marshall (far right) and her students describe core at MGRRE
Albian College’s Dr. Madeline Marshall’s examined the American Chem 44 and 45 cores. These cores recovered many intervals of shaley lithology that are often poorly preserved in outcrop.
MARCH 2024 UNIVERSITY STUDENTS EXAMINE AND DESCRIBE CORES AT MGRRE
Dr. Voice (second left) and his structural class students
WMU’s students in Dr. Peter Voice’s structure class examined cores from the Arms 10, Dalrymple, Polarsky 1-12B, US 2 over Sturgeon River, M-35 over Carp River, and the Roe A-2 wells, because they illustrate faults and other structural features.
Dr. Harrison (far left) welcomes MSU students and Dr. Krans (Dr. Krans, fourth from right)
Michigan State University’s students from Dr. Susan Krans’ sedimentary/stratigraphy class visited MGRRE for a Saturday to examine and describe clastic cores from the American Chem 44 and 45 cores from Mason County. They had previously examined these weathered formations at the Grand Ledge outcrop. Although these cored wells are within a few hundred feet of each other, they show some variability in sedimentary stacking patterns of facies that may represent lateral variability of depositional environments across this Pennsylvanian fluvial-deltaic plain.
MARCH 9, 2024 $2.25M AWARDED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY TO DR. AUTUMN HAAGSMA AND WMU'S ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT
The Department of Energy awarded $2.25M to Dr. Autumn Haagsma, Director of MGRRE and Assistant MGS Director, together with WMU’s Engineering Department. This funding will support creating a system of direct air capture of carbon dioxide (CEAS) and then safely storing the captured carbon underground in Michigan’s ideally suited geological formations (CAS). Dr. Haagsma was interviewed by WOOD TV 8. You can see the interview here. And you can read more about this research here and here.
FEBRUARY 2024 EASTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY GEOLOGY CLUB VISITS MGRRE
Eastern Michigan University Geology Club members talk with Bill Harrison (right).
Several members of the Geology Club from Eastern Michigan University came to examine cores and talk about subsurface geology with Bill Harrison. Some of our WMU Geology Club students enjoyed getting to know them too. They viewed cores from 3 wells: 1) the deepest well drilled in the state of Michigan, 2) a potash core, and 3) a well containing core from the Marshall Formation.
FEBRUARY 2024 OAKLAND ACADEMY STUDENTS EXAMINE CORES AT MGRRE
Linda Miller’s class from Oakland Academy visited MGRRE in February. They examined, smelled, and touched the samples as they learned about earth resources from Marie Solum, the Michigan Geological Survey K-12 outreach specialist.
JANUARY 24 and 25, 2024 MGRRE HOSTS GREAT LAKES GEOLOGIC MAPPING COALITION
MGRRE welcomed 35 members of the Great Lakes Geologic Mapping Coalition to hear each state give an update on their mapping, outreach, and drilling techniques. Members from Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin attended. They also examined examples of cores at MGRRE and in the Upper Peninsula.
JANUARY 19, 2024 SOMAT ENGINEERING DONATED SHALLOW BEDROCK CORES TO MGRRE
Sean Panetta, a WMU alum and geologist who works for Somat Engineering, arranged for Somat to donate several shallow bedrock cores to MGRRE. His firm drilled those cores for the I-75 modernization project in southeastern Michigan, and for the work on I-94 near Jackson. They also donated the geotechnical logs from the wells. We saw some coal in the cores near Jackson, where there is some concern for road collapse near some old, abandoned coal mines.
Cores from urban areas like these, that are covered with buildings and pavement, are so valuable to us. In such a densely populated area, it's very unlikely that other wells will be cored there. So, the data they provide really fills a gap.
We are always grateful that our alums think well of us and continue to help us by donating geological material that we will use in education and research.
JANUARY 2024 INTERNATINAL RESEARCHERS SAMPLE CORE AT MGRRE
MGRRE welcomed geologists to examine and sample Lower Silurian cores as part of their worldwide biostratigraphic research using Chitinozoans (microscopic flask-shaped fossils). Prof. Thijs Vandenbroucke, Ghent University, Belgium, Dr. Patrick McLaughlin, Illinois Geological Survey, and their Ghent University PhD student, Carolina Klock, sampled cores from 6 wells in 6 different Michigan counties to look for chitinozoans. Published research reports about age-dating work (by Bill Harrison, Andrew Caruthers, Matt Rine, Mohammed Al Musawi and others) using carbon isotope chronostratigraphy-dating, radioactive dating of zircons from Silurian ash beds, and conodont biostratigraphic dating brought international attention to this research and preserved cores here at MGRRE. Results from this new work will provide further time zone delineation worldwide to these Lower Silurian formations.
Upper, left to right: Bill Harrison, Patrick McLaughlin, and Thijs Vandenbroucke; Lower, left to right: Carolina Klock and Thijs Vandenbroucke
NOVEMBER 2, 2023 CORE WORKSHOP AT MGRRE
At our Carbonate Reservoir workshop, we welcomed 110 people to MGRRE. Ten speakers from industry, universities and government shared insights and experiences. We looked at cores from the Traverse, Dundee, Richfield, Niagaran, Burnt Bluff, and the Trenton/Black River formations.
Adam Wygant speaking to the group
Speakers (left to right): Bill Harrison, Adam Wygant, Kyle Patterson, Peter Voice, Matt Rine, Jacob Dunston, Autumn Haagsma, Dave Heinz, Amber Conner, and John Fowler
Bill Harrison, MGRRE Research Director, presented the MGRRE Lifetime Achievement award to both Dave Maness and Tim Maness. Growing up in their Dad Mabry Maness’s business, they have spent decades learning about geology, developing data, training interns, developing prospects, and ethically serving the industry—and donating materials and support to MGRRE.
Bill Harrison (left) presenting MGRRE Lifetime Achievement Awards to Dave Maness (center) and Tim Maness
“This is the highlight of my professional year,” said one speaker as he began his presentation. He and others not only shared their experiences, but enjoyed networking at every break and while examining cores. It was an excited, animated, heart-warming event.
October 25, 2023 CORE PRESERVATION WORK
Jen Trout worked to rebox a stratigraphy test core from near the Wayne County airport. The core preserves formations from the top of the bedrock to the Salina. In this densely populated area, there may never be another core drilled here. From older records, we know the tops of the formations. The boxes were badly deteriorated from water and insect damage, making the footages hard to read. Now that they have been reboxed and labeled for footage, they will be readily available for education and research.
SEPTEMBER 2023 WMU CLASSES EXAMINE SUBSURFACE SAMPLES AT MGRRE
Dr. Peter Voice and his clastic sedimentology class examined cores at MGRRE on September 6.
Dr. Steve Kaczmarek’s sedimentology and stratigraphy class members sampled cores at MGRRE on September 7.
MGS/MGRRE welcomed visitors from Carbon Solutions on September 7.
JULY 2023 DRS. VOICE AND ZAMBITO LEAD UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT RESEARCHERS AT MGRRE
Through a Keck Foundation grant, Dr. Jay Zambito, Professor of Geology, Beloit College and Dr. Peter Voice, Faculty Teaching Specialist, Western Michigan University, welcomed nine undergraduate students from across the United States to MGRRE. They examined and sampled cores from the Traverse-Ellsworth interval. After their week here, the group traveled to the Beloit Paleo Lab, where they ran analyses on those samples, including magnetic susceptibility, XRF elemental data, carbon isotopes from organic matter, and SEM. Most of the students will continue to work on their projects through the academic year and will present their work at the NC-GSA meeting in April 2024.
Dr. Voice shows the class how to describe cores
Dr. Zambito helping with core sampling
Dr. Voice talks with students about subsurface resources.
JUNE 2023
"Mama, I found a brachiopod!" Although he’s only 10 years old, Conner is identifying fossils here at MGRRE. By matching photos of fossils to specimens themselves, he has sorted boxes of fossils. It’s possible he inherited some skills from his geologist Mom. Good work, Conner!
APRIL - MAY 2023 CONFERENCES AND WORKSHOPS
April 25-27 Autumn Haagsma Co-Chairs National CCUS Conference in Houston
Dr. Autumn Haagsma, MGRRE’s Director, delivered the opening comments as she co-chaired a national CCUS conference in Houston.
Dr. Autumn Haagsma, MGRRE’s Director, co-chaired a national Carbon Capture, Utilization and Storage (CCUS) conference in Houston. More than 1400 participants met to share ideas about climate change, carbon storage, and moving the world toward a carbon-neutral and sustainable energy future.
Autumn helped create a CCUS committee and launch the first American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) supported CCUS conference in 2021. Since that time, the CCUS conference has tripled in size, gained support from multiple leading organizations including the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG) and Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE). CCUS 2023 has gathered leading technical experts to demonstrate the ongoing need for petroleum geoscientists and engineers in the CCUS arena.
In her 2023 program opening remarks, she said: “Both the subsurface technical knowledge and related data sets developed by the petroleum industry are major inputs required for the world to successfully move towards a carbon-neutral and sustainable energy future."
The conference included 130 oral presentations and 54 poster presentations. More details about the conference can be found at https://ccusevent.org/
May 3 Drs. Peter Voice and Bill Harrison Conduct Core Workshop at MGRRE
As part of the annual North Central Section of the Geological Society of America (GSA), Peter Voice and Bill Harrison conducted a one-day core workshop at MGRRE. Examining cores from 18 wells, participants could lay hands on rocks from the Upper Precambrian through the entire Paleozoic, and from the Pleistocene. The oldest cores were 1.1 billion years old; the youngest were just 10,000 years old.
Those cores hold raw data about our freshwater resources, aggregate materials, hydrocarbon resources, potash, and building materials including sandstone, gypsum and limestone. They also illustrate how these materials were formed and deposited in the Michigan Basin.
Because Michigan is covered with hundreds of feet of glacial sediments, there are few outcrops where you can see the bedrock. However, you can come to MGRRE and examine these preserved resources.
APRIL 2023 MGRRE Welcomes Industry Members
(Left photo) Autumn Haagsma (left) reviews sandstone cores with Battelle geoscientist Beth Vanden Berg (right).
(Right photo) Bill Harrison (left) holds potash core as he and Michigan Potash & Salt Company CEO Ted Pagano (right) discuss the deposit with industry members.
We welcomed several industry members in April. Battelle geoscientist Beth Vanden Berg came to MGRRE examine and photograph sandstone cores. Beth is an old friend, having been a graduate student here. Autumn Haagsma, MGRRE Director, is also very interested in sandstone cores, so their common interest produced some fruitful discussions.
Once again, Bill Harrison, MGRRE Research Director, welcomed Ted Pagano, CEO of Michigan Potash & Salt Company, who brought several geologists to examine and discuss this large deposit of an essential fertilizer ingredient. Having the cores preserved here proved invaluable because they yielded the raw data to show that this is a world-class deposit of potash.
April 2023 WMU Classes Examine Cores at MGRRE
Several WMU Department of Geological and Environment Sciences classes visited MGRRE in April to examine cores and discuss how these materials were deposited and how they are used today.
Dr. Steve Kaczmarek leads graduate students through a lab exercise. From left to right, Jean Maurisset, Ashley Scott, Evan Hellner, Mohammed Al Musawi, Steve Kaczmarek, and Ariel Martin.
Dr. Heather Petcovic (far right), discusses cores with her incoming group of majors.
Dr. Petcovic’s students using hand lenses to examine core (left); and student taking notes about a core (right)
Dr. Peter Voice with his class (left); a student examines core (right)
April 5, 2023 Pink Evaporite in Core
Bill Harrison (above left) and Autumn Haagsma (above right) examine a core with pink salt that fills fractures in a core from a brine disposal well. Dr. Rachelle Kernen, Research Fellow with the University of Adelaide (center above), who studies evaporites, was very interested in the core. This calcareous shale in the Silurian Salina C shale has unusual large open fractures that were subsequently filled with this pink salt. In an ongoing study, we will interpret the history and mechanism of how this salt infilling occurred.
MARCH 24 and 25 2023 CMU and MSU Classes Learn about Core at MGRRE
Rachel Agardy and her sedimentation class from CMU visited MGRRE on March 24 to examine and describe one carbonate and one siliciclastic core. The formations represented in the siliciclastic core also outcrop at Grand Ledge. However, because of the destructive nature of weathering, some softer formations like shales are poorly preserved at the surface at Grand Ledge. The students could see all the formations in good preservation here in the cored samples.
Bill Harrison and Rachel Agardy (center) discuss cores with CMU students
On March 25, Susan Breightol and her sedimentology class from MSU spent a Saturday here examining two siliciclastic cores that were drilled 1,000 feet apart near Grand Ledge. All the formations are well preserved in these cores. By examining samples from these two cores, the students will be able to create a 3D view of the formations from these two well points.
Susan Breightol (left) examines cores with her MSU students
March 23, 2023 Waste Management Team Donates Core to MGRRE
Fred Sawyers and his team from Waste Management visited MGRRE to review the cores they donated to us from their recent waste disposal well. Bill Harrison talked about the rock types in the well and Autumn Haagsma discussed how we will use these cores in our CCUS research. We are always grateful when industry members donate cores and data to us.
February 2023 DOE Specialist visits MGRRE
Rose Dady visited MGRRE on February 24 to hear several Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences researchers discuss their work. Together with several Michigan legislative aids and Western’s vice presidents, they heard about unique research to positively address climate change, environmental issues, and to assess Michigan’s geological resources for energy and minerals. Rose Dady is the regional intergovernmental and external affairs specialist for the Midwest office of congressional and intergovernmental affairs of the U. S. Department of Energy.
Autumn Haagsma, Julie Schoyer, Rose Dady, and John Yellich (left to right) discuss resources
Chanho Park (left) and Dr. Mine Dogan reveal their drone
Dr. Matt Reeves speaks about his PFAS research
June 29, 2021
Work by WMU may reduce US dependency on
China for critical minerals
(Photo: Stibnite, an ore mineral of the critical commodity antimony, by Niki Wintzer, U.S. Geological Survey)
KALAMAZOO, Mich.—The Pentagon is quietly racing to track the U.S. output of rare earth minerals amid the ongoing trade dispute with China, Reuters reported in a July 12 story.
But Western Michigan University, home to the Michigan Geological Survey, has already been doing just that. In May, the University began working on a grant its state geological survey received to assess Michigan's potential for supplying some of the 35 minerals the federal government considers vital to the nation's security and economic prosperity.
Items on the list, which includes 15 rare earth minerals, are essential for producing everything from washing machines, energy-efficient light bulbs and smartphones to robots, electric cars and missile systems.
The need for states to conduct a critical minerals assessment became crystal clear earlier this year when the escalating trade war with China resulted in that country increasing tariffs to 25% on rare earth mineral exports to the United States and threatening to stop these shipments altogether.
And America was in a vulnerable position even before the current trade tensions. China temporarily stopped exporting rare earth minerals to Japan in 2010 during a dispute with that country. Plus, China had started imposing trade limits on rare earth exports at the turn of this century, scrapping them only in 2015 after a World Trade Organization ruling.
So, WMU didn't waste any time after a nationwide grant program was announced in the wake of President Donald Trump signing a presidential executive order calling for a federal strategy to ensure a reliable and secure supply of critical minerals. The University applied for a share of the U.S. Geological Survey funds and received the largest amount possible, $35,000.
"We use tons of stuff in our daily lives, and it's all related to technology. But we don't really understand or appreciate where all the things come from that make up that technology," says Dr. William B. Harrison III, principal investigator for the grant.
"I guess we just assume that we have all these different mineral products that we need. And it turns out we don't. They're there, but because other countries have put more emphasis on them, they're developing their resources a little more efficiently than we are."
America's dilemma
More than three decades ago, China embarked on a plan to capture the world market for rare earth minerals, in part by imposing few environmental or labor restrictions on mining companies and processors. It mines or processes about 95% of the global supply of rare earth minerals and has an estimated one-third of the world's rare earth reserves.
Meanwhile, the United States has only one rare earth minerals mine, the Mountain Pass Mine in California. Production there has stalled periodically because of closures due to contamination issues and more recently, bankruptcy. And despite reopening in 2018, the mine sends its output to China for final processing.
Harrison shows off a rock core that contains layers of potash, an essential fertilizer component.
Harrison says the United States is rich in geological natural resources, including a lot of the rare earth minerals that have magnetic and optical properties so useful in making electronics more efficient. But it also imports these and other critical minerals.
These exotic-sounding materials, such as germanium, lanthanum and yttrium, actually aren't rare. They just occur in low concentrations and are mixed in with other minerals. That makes them difficult and environmentally challenging to extract. Even though many are used for green technologies, they take huge amounts of water to process and can leave behind tons of toxic waste.
"These kinds of materials are so important to our technology and our everyday activities that we just can't afford not to have them. So the president issued an executive order," Harrison says.
"And now the various state agencies—the Department of the Interior, where the USGS is housed, and the Department of Energy and Department of Commerce—are all working together to develop plans and implement activities and objectives to begin this process of better understanding where our resources are and to maintain relationships with our allies to keep the supply chain going."
National fact-finding effort
Some 40 other state geological surveys received grants to assess the known and potential distribution and quality of critical mineral resources in their states. At WMU, Harrison is leading a research team comprised of John A. Yellich, director of the Michigan Geological Survey; Dr. Peter J. Voice, research scientist and geologist; Dr. Joyashish Thakurta, economic geologist; Jennifer L. Trout, data manager; and several graduate and undergraduate students.
MGRRE houses some 550,000 feet of rock cores from around Michigan.
The team will spend the next year cataloging and preserving both unpublished and previously published critical minerals information by digging through materials at the Michigan Geological Repository for Research and Education in WMU's Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences. Harrison founded MGRRE and serves as its director.
Both the repository and department are integral to the Michigan Geological Survey's work, and they have been since the state decided in 2011 to base the survey at WMU. Legislators approved the action primarily because of MGRRE, an archive of rock samples and oil, gas and water well records that constitute Michigan's most comprehensive collection of subsurface geological materials.
As part of the USGS assessment grant, WMU will make its findings available to the public as well as private companies.
The same will be true for a related grant from USGS that Yellich says the Michigan Geological Survey expects to be awarded later this summer. If the new funding comes through, WMU will partner with Michigan Technological University and map a 110-square-mile area of Dickinson County to confirm the geology of Michigan's Upper Peninsula.
Yellich, who is vice president of the American Association of State Geologists, says critical minerals were the focus of several presentations at the association's national meeting June 9-13.
"At the meeting," Yellich says, "USGS Director James Reilly also reinforced the collaborative benefits of the state geological surveys and the USGS to accomplish the immediate task of assessing the nation's geologic environments for rare earth elements and critical minerals."
Boosting student success, Michigan's economy
In addition to enhancing the nation's security and prosperity, Harrison notes that the ongoing assessment grant is beneficial for Michigan and for WMU students.
"We think it has upside potential for economic development. One way that you can generate new wealth in any region is to extract some new resources out of the ground. That would build the economy up and create jobs," he says.
"And a lot of students will be helping to assemble and scan publications, assemble geospatial data, and prepare maps. I know many students question what they're going to get with their degrees. But WMU students who do these kinds of studies have some skill sets that industry really wants to have. So from a student training standpoint, this is really valuable practical experience and one that lets them make an important contribution to the state and nation."
Trout sorts through some of the materials WMU has received from the state.
When it comes to contributions, one research team member already has made a startling discovery. Natural graphite, a designated critical mineral, can be found in the Upper Peninsula's Baraga County.
Trout mined that long-forgotten morsel from information in a collection of unpublished materials MGRRE received from the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, formerly the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. The materials include reports, handwritten notes, permits and other documents dating back 50 years.
"There's about a 30-mile stretch of graphite, and it's in a narrow belt. It was mined in 1911 and 1912 by a couple of different companies in open pit mines. And interestingly enough, there's a creek that runs real close by there called Plumbago, which is another word for graphite," she says.
"Graphite was mentioned in the first box that I pulled. I don't know what else we're going to find. A lot of these documents that I've been going through are not published anywhere. So this project will really help us get information back out to the public."
Team member Voice, an expert on Michigan's mining history, says the Ford Motor Co. owned quite a bit of the Baraga property and decades ago, used graphite in lubricants and paint. He is spearheading the assessment grant's review of published information about Michigan's critical minerals. What Voice is unearthing is being added to an extensive Michigan Geology bibliography that he previously compiled. It contains some 7,800 references to publications, with about 100 so far dealing with critical minerals.
That database also contains numerous references to potash—potassium chloride—an essential plant nutrient and key ingredient in fertilizer. MGRRE helped rediscover this salt in Michigan several years ago in another forgotten mineral deposit located under West Michigan's Osceola and Mecosta counties. The deposit features the purest and highest-grade potash being produced globally and is in the process of being developed by a commercial firm.
Looking forward
As WMU researchers and the Michigan Geological Survey continue to work on the assessment grant, Harrison says he's hopeful they will collect more information about the potential value of other mineral resources in the state.
"Whatever information is out there, it'll all be put into a big national database that anybody that's interested in exploring for these minerals can access. So, I think it's going to really stimulate private interest and private investment," he says.
"Companies would love to go out and do these kinds of projects, but they don't know what's there and they don't have the time or the resources to really go out and start looking in every state."
For more information, contact Harrison in the Michigan Geological Repository for Research at @email or (269) 387-8691 and Yellich in the Michigan Geological Survey at @email or (269) 387-8649. To learn more about those WMU facilities as well as related academic program offerings, visit the Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences website.
For more WMU news, arts and events, visit WMU News online.
June 2019
Michigan has Minerals America Needs
The Trump Administration's list of 35 mineral and mineral groups deemed critical to the nation includes several that are located in Michigan, although more research needs to be done to better characterize their locations, quantity and quality.
Magnesium, platinum and potash are just some of the critical minerals found in the state that Western Michigan University is using a grant from the U.S. Geological Survey to investigate.
The Critical list
Invaluable data is hidden in the hundreds of thousands of rock cores like these that WMU archives.
Thirty-three minerals and two mineral material groups appear on the list.
• Minerals: aluminum (bauxite), antimony, arsenic, barite, beryllium, bismuth, cesium, chromium, cobalt, fluorspar, gallium, germanium, graphite (natural), hafnium, helium, indium, lithium, magnesium, manganese, niobium, potash, rhenium, rubidium, scandium, strontium, tantalum, tellurium, tin, titanium, tungsten, uranium, vanadium and zirconium.
• Platinum group metals: iridium, osmium, palladium, platinum, rhodium, and ruthenium.
• Rare earth elements group: cerium, dysprosium, erbium, europium, gadolinium, holmium, lanthanum, lutetium, neodymium, praseodymium, samarium, terbium, thulium, ytterbium and yttrium. While some organizations count 17 elements in this group, USGS counts 15. It excludes promethium, and separates outs scandium.
Learn more about Trump's executive order and the nation's critical and non-critical mineral commodities by reviewing the report, Mineral Commodity Summaries 2019.
Michigan's geological makeup
The Michigan Geological Survey, part of WMU's Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences, notes that the state has two geologically distinctive areas.
One area, the western Upper Peninsula, has igneous and metamorphic rocks that host well-known, abundant and varied metallic mineral resources, including copper, iron, nickel, platinum group minerals, manganese and cobalt. The region also has some graphite resources and deposits of a phosphate mineral that contains certain rare earth minerals. Researchers have documented the presence of uranium, as well.
Meanwhile, geologic formations in the Lower Peninsula and eastern Upper Peninsula consist of sedimentary deposits that host non-metallic mineral resources, including a large deposit of potash, and lesser amounts of natural brine minerals, helium, magnesium, lithium, manganese, strontium and cesium.
Michigan's minerals
Together, Michigan's two peninsulas hold significant promise for boosting critical minerals production in the United States, says Dr. Peter J. Voice, a WMU research scientist and an expert on the state's mining history. For example:
- Preliminary mapping suggests that a large deposit of potash may occur in up to 22 lower Michigan counties and cover more than 8 million acres. Commercial quantities of this essential fertilizer component may exist in eight of those counties and encompass about 3 million acres.
- Magnesium compounds have been extracted from magnesium chloride-rich sandstone brines located in the central part of the Lower Peninsula. At present, one brine company is doing that in Manistee. Historically, the entire domestic supply of metallic magnesium from 1927 into the late 1930's was produced by the Dow Chemical Co. from Midland-area brine. Magnesium metal is commonly combined with other metals to make alloys that can withstand high temperatures. These alloys are used in oven and furnace liners and many aerospace applications.
- Nearly all cell phones and computers use platinum group minerals. Deposits of these minerals are associated with copper- and nickel-containing sulfide ore bodies in the Upper Peninsula. The Eagle mine in Marquette County already produces copper, nickel, and some platinum and palladium. A separate sulfide ore body unaffiliated with the mine has been identified in Houghton and Ontonagon counties.
For more information, contact Dr. William B. Harrison III, the principal investigator, at @email or (269) 387-8691.
Related stories
Work by WMU may reduce US dependency on China for critical minerals | June 24, 2019
WMU research facility assists in rediscovery of rare mineral deposit | Sept. 10, 2013
November 10, 2015
Wayne County Core Collection Donated to MGRRE
We received a large collection of shallow bedrock cores from Wayne County, Michigan. That’s an area where we previously had very few subsurface samples.
These cores were donated to MGRRE by an engineering firm that drilled 230 boreholes from 2003-2007 through a 7-mile-long abandoned Combined Sewage Outflow tunnel project in
Detroit. These cores represent Antrim, Squaw Bay, and Dundee formations, as well as the Detroit River and Traverse Groups.
These cores hold raw data that can be used by land use planners, governmental agencies, academia, industry and developers. That information will support better policy decisions to promote sustained, balanced development to support our economy and quality of life.
September 10, 2013
WMU research facility assists in rediscovery of rare mineral deposit
Contact: Cheryl Roland
September 10, 2013
The Harrisons with Theodore Pagano (center)
KALAMAZOO—Rediscovery of a long-forgotten mineral deposit located under two West Michigan counties is set to spark a new multibillion industry in Michigan that will quickly position the state as the nation's leading source for a critical agricultural tool that is in demand internationally.
Potash—potassium chloride—is an essential plant nutrient and critical ingredient in fertilizer. Currently mined in only three locations in the nation, supplies are dwindling and prices skyrocketing. Now, one of the highest-quality potash ore deposits in the world has been identified below the surface of West Michigan.
A valuable resource
The discovery was made by using the treasure trove of geologic data that is housed at Western Michigan University's Michigan Geological Repository for Research and Education. The result of the rediscovery, say geologists, will be the introduction of a new industry in Michigan worth as much as $65 billion, easily surpassing the state's historical oil and gas production revenues and triggering explosive job growth in Osceola and Mecosta counties.
"This is conceivably one of Michigan's most valuable resources," says Theodore A. Pagano, a potash geologist, engineer and general manager of Michigan Potash Co. LLC. That firm now controls the rediscovered potassium ore reserve called the Borgen Bed that lies under more than 14,500 acres in the two counties. His company has worked quietly over the past three years to ensure the reserve could be technically, economically and logistically put into production and compete head to head with the New Mexico and western Canadian mines that are now the major North American sources of potash.
"This is the United States' only shovel-ready potash project," Pagano says. "Michigan is New Mexico untapped. What we're looking at is the introduction of an industry that is critical to the economic health of the state. We'll be producing a Michigan product for Michigan farmers that would dramatically reduce the expensive transport costs on the more than 300,000 tons of potash consumed in our state annually.
Verification of the quality and amount of the potash in the Borgen Bed was done by using core samples provided by WMU geologists under the direction of Dr. William B. Harrison III, professor emeritus of geosciences and director of his department's Geological Repository for Research and Education.
In 2008, Harrison and his wife, Linda, an administrator with the repository, came into possession of geologic core samples collected in the early 1980s when a Canadian company was prospecting for potash in Michigan. That company established a mine and small processing plant in Michigan but pulled back from fully commercializing the deposit. Over the years, changing business plans and corporate mergers pushed the Michigan operation into the background, and mineral leases for the area lapsed. The sample cores came to WMU by chance and were added into the University's statewide collection of such core samples.
"Without Bill and Linda Harrison, Michigan and the United States would be without the rediscovery of a multi-billion dollar potash deposit," says Pagano who learned through industry sources that the Harrisons might be able to help him in his quest to define the scope and quality of the Borgen Bed.
About potash
A potash sample, housed in WMU's Geological Repository for Research and Education
Potash is found in just a few areas once covered by inland seas. The seas evaporated and the potassium and sodium chloride deposits crystallized into potash ore and were covered by successive layers of rock and soil.
The Michigan deposit, WMU's Harrison says, is the purest and highest-grade potash being produced globally—600 percent higher than that being produced in New Mexico's vast Permian Basin. It is also twice the grade of deposits found in Canada and Russia, the two nations that control more than 80 percent of the world's potash reserve.
"One of the things that makes this so valuable is that it is an incredibly rich deposit that is in easy reach of the enormous demand from Midwest corn and soybean farmers who operate within a 500-mile radius of this deposit." Harrison says. "This is an opportunity for new wealth to come from the use of natural resources never tapped before."
Pagano has been working with investors and state and national officials to move forward with the capital-intensive establishment of manufacturing and processing facilities. He estimates an initial demand for more than 300 workers employed in an enterprise that will produce more than a million tons of potash annually.
Bringing Michigan potash to market, Pagano says, will provide a domestic source of the element at reduced cost to Midwest farmers as well as to the national agriculture industry. It will reduce imports, improve the nation's trade balance, create jobs and increase the state's tax base.
"It's our responsibility to develop this wisely and in a way that moves Michigan forward," Pagano says.
About WMU's Michigan geologic research resources
WMU has been home since 1982 to an extensive set of one-of-a-kind core samples and well records that have made the University the preeminent source for data on Michigan's subsurface geologic layers. WMU's Michigan Geological Repository for Research and Education makes information about those layers available by maintaining extensive online databases and housing the most comprehensive archive of Michigan geological samples and data. That archive includes more than 500,000 feet of rock cores from oil, gas, water and environmental research wells and from glacial research and Lake Michigan bluff erosion studies. It also contains impressive collections of geologic maps, and thousands of drillers' reports, electrical and mechanical logs, mudlogs, porosity and permeability analyses, and related well data.
In 2011, the state of Michigan tapped WMU to serve as home to the Michigan Geological Survey. The move made WMU Michigan's designated geoscience agency and put responsibility for mapping and assessing the state's geological resources—such as minerals, soils and groundwater—in the hands of the University's Department of Geosciences, which was already a storehouse of information concerning the state's groundwater, mineral and oil and gas resources.
For more information about the initiative, contact Pagano at @email.
For information about WMU's geologic data resources or details on the science behind potash formation, contact the Harrisons at (269) 387-8633 or (269) 387-8691.