Abstract
In marine environments, Recent and fossil shorelines are special targets of interest for hard mineral resources exploration on account of their close relationship with both their mineral constituents and the physical forces responsible for the accumulation of these minerals. Such occurrences of heavy minerals, associated with littoral features (shoreface, shore and dune), are displayed on the West African coast of Gabon-Congo and Senegal-Mauritania.
Holocene phosphatic coprolites of the Congolese and Gabonese shelves are reworked from Miocene and Eocene submarine outcrops. The water depth in the area ranges uniformly from ~ 30 to 50 m. The phosphatic deposits are flat-lying, shallow and largely unconsolidated. Their high grade is related to the winnowing and sorting of the Holocene shoreline deposits for the last 8,000 years. In the Republic of Congo, there are large deposits of muddy glauconite and glauconitic carbonate mud on the continental shelf adjacent to a 18,000 years old shoreline. On the adjacent land, vast stretches of very poor, sandy soils could potentially benefit from having the glauconite applied as an unprocessed fertilizer. Trial applications have shown that glauconite produces good yields and preserves an adequate level of soil fertility despite considerable leaching. Pleistocene and Holocene beaches of West African coasts contain numerous layers rich in Ti- and Zr- minerals. In the shallow waters of the Ivory Coast (Vridi-Fresco), Senegal (Mbour-Joal; Cayar-St. Louis) and Mauritania (Aftout es Saheli; South Cap Timiris) concentrations of ilmenite and zircon occur in sedimentary beds. These heavy minerals are reworked from old littoral dunes or dune massifs by erosion and deposited along the present shore by waves.
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Barusseau, J.P., Giresse, P. (1987). Some Mineral Resources of the West African Continental Shelves Related to Holocene Shorelines: Phosphorite (Gabon, Congo), Glauconite (Congo) and Ilmenite (Senegal, Mauritania). In: Teleki, P.G., Dobson, M.R., Moore, J.R., von Stackelberg, U. (eds) Marine Minerals. NATO ASI Series, vol 194. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-3803-8_11
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