ANCORELOG - Analytical Core Logging System

Country / Region: Belgium, Germany, Finland, France, Sweden, Spain

Begin of project: April 1, 2018

End of project: March 31, 2021

Status of project: January 3, 2021

Fig. 1: Drill cores from orogenic gold deposit Source: BGR

The "ANCORELOG - Analytical Core Logging System" project was a three-year project funded by the EU through EIT RawMaterials as part of its funding program "KAVA Upscaling projects". The project ran from 2018 to 2021 and was carried out jointly by twelve project partners.

The subject of the ANCORELOG project war the prototype development of a mobile raw material analysis system, Analytical Core Logging System, with which the innovative combination of modern technologies enables precise on-site real-time analysis of the chemical, physical, and textural properties of geological raw materials.

BGR’s focus was on the validation of a LIBS-based drill core analysis (LIBS: Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy) for selected drill cores from project partners. Drill cores from an orogenic gold deposit, a massive sulphide deposit and a bauxite deposit were examined. The multivariate calibration method Partial Least Square Regression (PLSR) was used for calibration purposes.

LIBS is a powerful and versatile multi-element method for a very wide range of elements. LIBS is a type of emission spectroscopy that uses a laser to generate a plasma directly on the sample surface. The light that is emitted when the plasma breaks down and is characteristic of the available elements is subsequently measured with a spectrometer. Promising applications are being explored at BGR using this type of spectroscopy in a core scanner, enabling measurements of the distribution of various elements in the submillimetre resolution for entire core meters.

Literature:

Meima, J.A., Orberger, B., García Piña, C., Prudhomme, A., Dittrich, C., 2021, Increasing Resource Efficiency of Bauxites Using LIBS. Mater. Proc. 5, 81. https://doi.org/10.3390/materproc2021005081

Partner:

• DMT GmbH & Co. KG, Deutschland (project coordinator)
• Bundesanstalt für Geowissenschaften und Rohstoffe (BGR), Deutschland
• Catura Geoprojects (Geosciences Conseil), Frankreich
• ERAMAET Research, Frankreich
• Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V., Deutschland
• Geological Survey of Finland (GTK), Finnland
• J&C Bachmann GmbH, Deutschland
• LTB Lasertechnik Berlin GmbH, Deutschland
• LTU Business AB, Schweden
• Minas de Aguas Teñidas SAU, Spanien
• Universität de Liège, Belgien
• Université Paris Sud-Paris Saclay, Frankreich

Promotion / document number:

Nr. 17028 (EIT RawMaterials)