As Madencilik Türkiye Magazine we conducted an interview with the of MTA(General Directorate of Mineral Research and Exploration) General Manager,Cengiz Erdem to have further information about the exploration works MTA conducted. According to information Cengiz Erdem gave us, MTA have been discovered by MTA 102 new mineral resources with 2.5 million meters of drilling in 2017-2018 period.
Within the scope of drilling works in the last two years, copper, lead-zinc, iron, chromium, tenardite, bentonite, huntite, feldspar, graphite, Rare Earth Elements (NTE) and uranium-niobium fields were discovered in the provinces of Manisa, İzmir, Balıkesir, Ordu, Trabzon, Gümüşhane, Artvin, Niğde, Kastamonu, Erzurum, Ankara, Kırıkkale, Kayseri, Kırklareli, Burdur, Eskişehir, Malatya, Kahramanmaraş, Afyon, Çankırı and Bursa. MTA also discovered geothermal resources were determined along with coal, uranium and bituminous shale areas in the provinces of Edirne, Kırklareli, Tekirdağ, İstanbul, Muş, Afyon, Çorum, Amasya, Ankara, Eskişehir, Konya, Elazığ, Nevşehir, Manisa and Bolu.
Cengiz Erdem shared the information about the fields on resource basis. Erdem stated: “as a result of the exploration works conducted by MTA, 3.3 billion tons of coal with various calorific value (between 2000 and 3500 calories), 1.5 billion tons of tenardite, 190 million tons of bentonite, 265 tons of metal gold, 500,000 tons of metal copper, 4 million tons of metal lead – zinc, 35,000 tons of metal Rare Earth Elements and 2000 tons of uranium sources was discovered.”
MTA General Manager Cengiz Erdem also emphasized that the resources identified so far have a value above 200 billion dollars and they will continue working on these fields.
