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| 733031033 | mineral resource | Concentration of naturally occurring solid, liquid, or gaseous material in or on the earth's crust in a form and amount such that extracting and converting it into useful materials or items is currently or potentially profitable. Mineral resources are classified as metallic (such as iron and tin ores) or nonmetallic (such as fossil fuels, sand, and salt). | |
| 733031034 | identified resource | Deposits of a particular mineral-bearing material of which the location, quantity, and quality are known or have been estimated from direct geological evidence and measurements | |
| 733031035 | undiscovered resource | Potential supplies of a particular mineral resource, believed to exist because of geologic knowledge and theory, although specific locations, quality, and amounts are unknown. | |
| 733031036 | reserves | Resources that have been identified and from which a usable mineral can be extracted profitably at present prices with current mining technology. | |
| 733031037 | other resources | Identified and undiscovered resources not classified as reserves. | |
| 733031038 | ore | Part of a metal-yielding material that can be economically and legally extracted at a given time. An ore typically contains two parts: the ore mineral, which contains the desired metal, and waste mineral material (gangue). | |
| 733031039 | surface mining | Removing soil, subsoil, and other strata and then extracting a mineral deposit found fairly close to the earth's surface. | |
| 733031040 | overburden | Layer of soil and rock overlying a mineral deposit. Surface mining removes this layer. | |
| 733031041 | open-pit mining | Removing minerals such as gravel, sand, and metal ores by digging them out of the earth's surface and leaving an open pit. | |
| 733031042 | dredging | Type of surface mining in which chain buckets and draglines scrape up sand, gravel, and other surface deposits covered with water. It is also used to remove sediment from streams and harbors to maintain shipping channels. | |
| 733031043 | area strip mining | Type of surface mining used where the terrain is flat. An earthmover strips away the overburden, and a power shovel digs a cut to remove the mineral deposit. After removal of the mineral, the trench is filled with overburden, and a new cut is made parallel to the previous one. The process is repeated over the entire site. | |
| 733031044 | contour strip mining | Form of surface mining used on hilly or mountainous terrain. A power shovel cuts a series of terraces into the side of a hill. An earthmover removes the overburden, and a power shovel extracts the coal, with the overburden from each new terrace dumped onto the one below. | |
| 733031045 | mountaintop removal | Type of surface mining that uses explosives, massive shovels, and even larger machinery called draglines to remove the top of a mountain to expose seams of coal underneath a mountain. | |
| 733031046 | subsurface mining | Extraction of a metal ore or fuel resource such as coal from a deep underground deposit. | |
| 733031047 | smelting | Process in which a desired metal is separated from the other elements in an ore mineral. | |
| 733031048 | depletion time | The time it takes to use a certain fraction, usually 80%, of the known or estimated supply of a nonrenewable resource at an assumed rate of use. Finding and extracting the remaining 20% usually costs more than it is worth. | |
| 733031049 | reserve-to-production ratio | Number of years reserves of a particular nonrenewable mineral will last at current annual production rates. | |
| 733031050 | net energy | Total amount of useful energy available from an energy resource or energy system over its lifetime, minus the amount of energy used (the first energy law), automatically wasted (the second energy law), and unnecessarily wasted in finding, processing, concentrating, and transporting it to users. | |
| 733031051 | crude oil (petroleum) | Gooey liquid consisting mostly of hydrocarbon compounds and small amounts of compounds that contain oxygen, sulfur, and nitrogen. It is extracted from underground and sent to refineries where it is converted to heating oil, diesel fuel, gasoline, tar, and other materials. | |
| 733031052 | petrochemicals | Chemicals obtained by refining (distilling) crude oil. They are used as raw materials in manufacturing most industrial chemicals, fertilizers, pesticides, plastics, synthetic fibers, paints, medicines, and many other products. | |
| 733031053 | natural gas | Underground deposits of gases consisting of 50-90% by weight methane gas (CH4) and small amounts of heavier gaseous hydrocarbon compounds such as propane (C3H8) and butane (C4H10). | |
| 733031054 | liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) | Mixture of liquefied propane (C3H8) and butane (C4H10) gas removed from natural gas and used as a fuel. | |
| 733031055 | liquefied natural gas (LNG) | Natural gas converted to liquid form by cooling to a very low temperature. | |
| 733031056 | coal | Solid, combustible mixture of organic compounds with 30-98% carbon by weight, mixed with various amounts of water and small amounts of sulfur and nitrogen compounds. It is formed in several stages as the remains of plants are subjected to heat and pressure over millions of years. | |
| 733031057 | breeder nuclear fission reactors | Nuclear fission reactor that produces more nuclear fuel than it consumes by converting nonfissionable uranium-238 into fissionable plutonium-239 |
