United States mines in 2016 produced an estimated $74.6 billion of raw mineral materials, a slight increase from 2015, reports the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in its 40th annual Mineral Commodity Summaries report.
The Mineral Commodity Summaries report is a comprehensive source of 2016 mineral production data for the world. According to USGS, it includes statistics on more than 88 mineral commodities that are important to the U.S. economy and national security. The report also covers events, trends and issues in the domestic and international minerals industries.
According to USGS, a key finding from the report is that during 2016, the United States was 100 percent import reliant on 20 mineral commodities, including rare earths, manganese and niobium.
The report also revealed the United States produced 13 mineral commodities in 2016 that were worth more than $1 billion each. In addition, the estimated value of total U.S. industrial minerals production in 2016 was $51.6 billion, 5 percent more than that of 2015.
In 2016, 11 states produced more than $2 billion worth of non-fuel mineral commodities in 2016. According to USGS, these states, in descending order of value, include Nevada, Arizona, Texas, California, Minnesota, Florida, Alaska, Michigan, Wyoming, Missouri and Utah.
“The Mineral Commodity Summaries provide crucial, unbiased statistics that decision makers and policy makers, in both the private and public sectors, rely on to make business decisions and national policy,” says Steven Fortier, director of the USGS National Minerals Information Center. “Industries – such as steel, aerospace and electronics – processed non-fuel mineral materials and created an estimated $2.8 trillion in value-added products in 2016, which contributed 15 percent to the total U.S. gross domestic product.”
