Chapter 229 Mineral Resources Mining and Electric Power
Chapter 229 Mineral Resource Mining and Electric Power
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The industrial era is inseparable from coal and raw materials such as iron, copper, aluminum, and zinc. Mineral resources are unevenly distributed in the South American continent. Coal and iron ore resources are insufficient in La Plata, while iron ore resources, coal and other resources that are easier to mine are either Located in the interior of Brazil, or in countries such as Chile, Venezuela, and Colombia, Han has limited local mineral resource reserves. In the early stages, supporting a population of several million for industrial development is not a big problem. Once the population reaches tens of millions, local reserves will The mineral resources will be difficult to sustain the country's industrial development.
Part of the raw materials for China's current steel industry come from the Corrales mines in Santa Catarina and northern Uruguay, and part of them come from the mines on the north shore of Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela.
Before the discovery of the Corrales mine in northern Uruguay, the iron ore and coal mines in Santa Catarina had always been the country's main supplier of industrial raw materials. After occupying 60,000 square kilometers of land in northern Uruguay, exploration The team has successively discovered several medium-sized iron ores, manganese ores and coal mines near Corrales. Although the quality of the coal in the Corrales mining area is not as good as the anthracite coal in Quang Ninh Province, Annan, it is similar to Santa Catarina. Compared with the quality of coal in Corrales, the coal mines in Corrales are still better.
Quang Ninh Province, occupied by the Nanyang Corps of the National Defense Force, is a famous coal producing area in Annan. The anthracite coal produced in Quang Ninh Hong Kei not only supplied the domestic industrial construction in Annan in later generations, but was also exported to mainland China, Japan and other countries.
The Hongji coal mining area is more than 100 kilometers long and 15-20 kilometers wide, with a coal reserve of 2.25 billion tons. The coal seams are thick and the topsoil is thin, making it suitable for outcrop mining.
In 1872, when Li Mingyuan began to form a professional mineral exploration force, the Hongji Coal Mine had been discovered by the local garrison and reported to the National Defense Force headquarters via telegram.
At that time, Li Mingyuan received the information reported by the troops. He was happy but also troubled. The coal output of Hongji Coal Mine was much higher than the local coal output of Han Dynasty, but such a high-quality coal field could not support Local industrial construction.
Annan is too far away from South America. Coal is transported to South America by ocean-going ships. The freight cost alone can significantly increase the cost of coal. Although coal is an essential raw material for industry, its value is not as good as that of iron. , copper, aluminum and other metal raw materials. Therefore, after reading the information passed by the Nanyang troops, Li Mingyuan just reminded them to open up some production areas as mines, leaving the unmined coal production areas for later processing.
Hongji coal mines cannot be transported to South America, and the Coral coal mines of inferior quality have assumed the main function of supplying domestic industrial development. Around the Corrales mining area, relying on the advantage of being close to resource origins, the utilization quality of each coal mine is relatively high. Cement plants, brick kilns and briquette manufacturing plants that used poor coal as fuel quickly developed, providing many construction materials for Han's domestic infrastructure construction. At the same time, as the exploration troops expanded their exploration scope in the local area, in 1876, a Large-scale manganese ores were discovered. Due to the development of electric power science, metals such as manganese, aluminum, and zinc have been able to be separated from metal oxides. Among them, the production technology introduced by Han Dynasty to use aluminum nitride and sodium as raw materials to prepare aluminum has been Entering the production stage.
The method of preparing aluminum from aluminum nitride and sodium invented by St. Clair in 1854 greatly reduced the cost of aluminum. However, because aluminum at this time was mainly used to make luxury goods and decorations, this method was not widely used.
Li Mingyuan went to college for two years before becoming a mercenary. When he was in junior high school, he learned experiments on using electrolysis to prepare various metals. Therefore, after understanding that electrolysis was the mainstream method for preparing various metals, Li Mingyuan returned from studying abroad.
More than 200 Chinese students were selected to work on electric power research and development experiments together with the not-yet-famous physicists Jedlik, Eström and others invited from Europe.
Improve arc lamps, develop rotating magnetic field alternators, and improve the process of preparing metals by electrolysis. Based on the actual situation in Han Dynasty, Li Mingyuan formulated three major research directions for researchers.
The industrial production of aluminum, zinc, copper and other metal elements through electrolytic processes requires a large amount of power support. Therefore, the large-scale manganese mines in Corrales cannot be effectively developed while the domestic generator research and development project in Han has not been completed.
However, Li Mingyuan is not worried about delaying the mining of manganese ore, because after he used the chemistry and physics knowledge of later generations to guide the researchers several times, the generator project has made great progress. According to the calculations of the researchers, it is only 100 days away from the success of the project.
The final time will not exceed half a year. Faced with the confident assurance of the researchers, Li Mingyuan had no doubts. In the original time and space, Bayer proposed a simple purification method a few years later, which greatly improved the efficiency of refining metals, and this process
It has been used until later generations. Now Li Mingyuan has not only told researchers the principles of later generators, but also proposed the Bayer process method. If they did this, they would not be able to develop the rotating magnetic field alternator four or five years in advance.
Li Mingyuan could only cry out helplessly.
The third industrial revolution was a change caused by electricity.
In terms of electric power development, Han has sent overseas students to study electric power technology that has not been taken seriously by the West. The development level of Han is not very different from that of Western countries. In addition, Li Mingyuan attaches great importance to the research and development of electric power. Han is most likely to catch up in electric power.
reach the level of development of Western countries.
In July 1877, soldiers of the National Defense Forces stationed near Corrales accidentally discovered a large amount of gold sand in a river in the valley while participating in field exercises. After receiving the news, the exploration team carried out exploration along the river bank, and finally found gold sands 30 meters away from the discovery site.
A rare giant gold mine was discovered seven or eight kilometers away.
The gold mine accidentally discovered by the National Defense Force soldiers was part of the Corrales mine resources. According to the production technology of the 20th century, the gold mine was enough for Uruguay to develop for sixty years. However, in the second half of the 19th century, the Han government could not act like later generations.
Like the Uruguayan government, it uses relatively mature mining equipment to mine all gold reserves.
Excavation of gold deposits buried in rocks requires high-strength synthetic steel. In the steel industry, the Han Dynasty recruited Mannister. In 1877, eight years in advance, Mannister was widely used in the rolling steel processing industry.
The pipe method was invented, but Li Mingyuan didn’t know much about the synthesis of special steel and did not give key advice to the European experts hired at high prices. Therefore, Han’s special steel synthesis technology has not made significant progress, and the entire synthetic metal technology is still in the process of exploration.
stage.
More than 95% of the mineral deposits in the Corrales Gold Mine are buried deep in the rocks and cannot be mined. A small amount of the mineral deposits contained in the underlying rocks are distributed in a scattered manner. The mining output is limited according to the existing technology, so the gold standard is being carried out.
During the currency reform, Li Mingyuan did not choose to use the gold produced by the Corrales Gold Mine as a reserve for issuing banknotes. Instead, he decided to send people to venture into India.
There is little profit from the mining of shallow mineral deposits in the Corrales gold mine, and in view of the annexation of Argentina by the National Defense Forces, Uruguay's final date is getting closer and closer. The Corrales gold mine, like the mining fields in the Congo region, is in a state of storage and needs to wait until the war of unification.
