The non-economic minerals that surround, mix with, or host an ore deposit. In a mining operation, gangue must be mined alongside the valuable minerals and then separated out during processing to create a concentrate. Common gangue minerals include quartz, calcite, and various silicates.
Heard on the job
The vein is rich in copper, but there's so much quartz gangue that our milling costs are going to eat up the profit.
Do not mix it up with
- Deads: Gangue is the worthless mineral intimately mixed in the ore itself, while deads are barren rocks broken and discarded in the mine without processing.