Geology of uranium-bearing veins in the conterminous United States

Abstract

In the few years that have elapsed since uranium first became important in fields of atomic energy, a vast fund of geologic and related information has been collected by personnel of the U.S. Geological Survey; the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission or its predecessor organization, the Manhattan Engineer District ; and, to a lesser extent, by staff members of other Federal and State agencies and by geologists in private industry. In this collection of geologic information are data of different kinds that bear directly on an understanding of the fundamental geology controlling the distribution of uranium in veins and that aid in understanding various hypotheses of origin for veins. Veins, as defined herein, are masses of introduced minerals in and adjacent to fractures and fissures; the definition excludes any implications as to crystallization temperatures or to special mineral assemblages. Veins may contain uranium largely in the 4-valent state, entirely in the 6-valent state, or, most commonly, in both states. A descriptive and arbitrary classification based on mineral content of these veins is used in this report; 8 mineralogic classes of uranium-bearing veins are established, 7 of which are known to occur in the conterminous United States. The pre-1940 history of uranium mining and geology is concerned largely with veins in widely separated parts of the world: included are deposits in Europe, South Africa, northern Canada, South Australia, and, to a limited extent, the United States. During and since the 1940's, many uranium-bearing veins were discovered in the conterminous United States; but, in general, these discoveries were completely overshadowed by the discovery and developnien't of a number of very large nonvein deposits in New Mexico; in Big Indian Wash and White Canyon, Utah; and in the Gas Hills, Wyoming. Very large deposits of uranium in northern Saskatchewan, Canada; near Blind River, Canada ; and in the Witwatersrand, South Africa, also were discovered and developed during this period. Hundreds of uranium-bearing veins have been reported in the conterminous United States, in perhaps as many as 900 different localities. Most of the known uranium-bearing veins are in the western United States in such areas as the Front Range mineral belt of Colorado; the

Alteration products of uraninite from the Colorado Plateau

“…1). These samples were selected for the following reasons: 1) Uranium mineralization is young and radiogenic Pb-content is low [29], mostly from Late Cretaceous-Early Tertiary to Late Tertiary (73 to 2 million years in age [33,34]). 2) Strong alteration has occurred since the uranium mineralization.…”

Principal uranium deposits of the world

“…(Young and Lahr, 1975). References: Adams and others, 1953;Bird and Stafford, 1955;Butler, 1964;Downs and Bird, 1965;Heyse, 1971;Rich and others, 1975;Sheridan, 1956Sheridan, , 1958Sheridan andothers, 1958, 1967;-Sims, 1956;Sims and Sheridan, 1964;Sims and others, 1963;Walker and Osterwald, 1963;Wright and Everhart, 1960;Young and Lahr, 1975. Symbol: 16CVM Name:…”

“…References: Barrington and Kerr, 1961;Becraft andWeiss, 1957, 1963;Everhart, 1956;Nash and Lehrman, 1975;Norman, 1957;Osterwald, 1965;Rich andothers, 1975, 1977;Sheldon, 1959;Tatsch, 1976;Thurlow, 1957;von Backstrtim, 1974;Walker and Osterwald, 1963;Walker, Osterwald, and Adams, 1963;Weissenborn and Moen, 1974. Symbol: 2DSM Name:…”

“…References: Gross and others, 1958;Matthews, 1955;Peterson, 1958Peterson, , 1959Peterson, , 1969Rich and others, 1975;Schafer, 1955Schafer, , 1956Walker and Osterwald, 1963. Symbol: 5CSS Name:…”

The geology and hydrothermal alteration of the Bear Creek Butte area, Crook County, central Oregon

“…This episodic boiling created a prograding system common in epithermal mineralization (Blakestad and Stanley, 1984). Silicic igneous rocks have relatively high U concentrations when compared to rocks of more mafic compositions and are commonly associated with U occurrences (Walker and Osterwald, 1963 (Zielinski, 1979(Zielinski, , 1980. It also allows more surf ace area to be exposed to the leaching solution.…”