Sudbury Basin

The most important single deposit of nickel is at Sudbury Basin, Canada. It was discovered in 1883 during the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway and consists of sulfide outcrops situated around the rim of a huge basin 17 miles wide and 37 miles long (possibly a meteoritic crater). Fifteen elements are currently extracted from this region (Ni, Cu, Co, Fe, S, Te, Se, Au, Ag and the six platinum metals). 

A significant mining and smelting footprint exists in the Sudbury basin which hosts numerous world-class Ni-Cu-PGE deposits. This footprint poses a... 

Frape S. K. and Fritz P. (1982) The chemistry and isotopic composition of saline groundwaters from the Sudbury Basin, Ontario. Can. J. Earth Set 19, 645-661. 

Hemming S. R., McDaniel D. K., McLennan S. M., and Hanson G. N. (1996) Pb isotope constraints on the provenance and diagenesis of detrital feldspars from the Sudbury basin, Canada. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett. 142(3— 4), 501-512. 

Most of the nickel used in the United States is imported or obtained from recycling. As of 2008, the largest producers of nickel metal included Russia, Canada, Indonesia, Australia, and New Caledonia. One of the world s largest single deposits of nickel is located at Sudbury Basin,... 

Ontario, Canada. The deposit was discovered in 1883. It covers an area 17 miles (27 kilometers) wide and 37 miles (59 kilometers) long. Some experts believe the deposit was created when a meteorite struck the earth at Sudbury Basin. 

Figure 19. Plot of Li isotopic composition vs. inverse Li concentration for lakes and basinal/oilfield brines. Lakes open circle = major global lakes (Chan and Edmond 1988 Falkner et al. 1997) semi-open circle = western U.S. closed basin lakes (Tomascak et al. 2003). Oilfield brines inverted triangle = Williston basin, Saskatchewan (Bottomley et al. 2003) diamond = Israeli oilfields (Chan et al. 2002d). Mine waters (Canadian Shield basinal brines) square = Yellowknife, NWT (Bottomley et al. 1999) triangle = Sudbury, Ontario, area (Bottomley et al. 2003) star = Thompson, Manitoba, area (Bottomley et al. 2003). Average composition of seawater is included for reference.

For example, Dillon et al. (1979) followed the response of several lakes in the vicinity of Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. Wright (1985) conducted a three-lake study at the Hovvatn site in southern Norway. There, two lake basins were limed in 1981 by several methods, including dispersal on ice and along the shore. A contiguous lake with similar initial chemistry served as a reference lake. A major finding was the rapid rate... 

Nickel concentrations are comparatively elevated in aquatic plants and animals in the vicinity of nickel smelters, nickel-cadmium battery plants, electroplating plants, sewage outfalls, coal ash disposal basins, and heavily populated areas. For example, at Sudbury, Ontario, mean nickel concentrations, in mg/kg DW, were 22.0 in larvae of aquatic insects, 25.0 in zooplankton, and 290.0 in aquatic weeds maximum concentrations reported were 921.0 mg/kg DW in gut of crayfish (Cambarus bartoni) and... 

It has been demonstrated quite dramatically that when acid rain and air pollution were so severe that large areas such as that in the Copper Basin of Tennessee and around Sudbury, Canada, lose most of their vegetation, the soils may be severely degraded. Roughly,... 

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