JWHITE-37
Pachnolite
Ivigtut Cryolite deposit, Ivigtut, Kitaa (West Greenland) Province, Greenland
Cabinet, 9.4 x 6.8 x 4.1 cm
Ex. John S. White
SOLD
Pachnolite is one of those bizarre rare aluminum minerals that comes from, came from rather, this incredibly remote and difficult locality in Greenland. It was mined to extract aluminum in the 1800s and early 1900s until more modern processes using bauxite ore made this deposit not cost-economic to mine (and the waters had to be kept out at great expense as they went deeper, too). Today, the deposit is inaccessible and these minerals are extremely hard to obtain as specimens. This is a very large, solid mass of completely pachnolite, like one seldom sees! The piece is sparkly and pretty. It is composed of pachnolite in small crystals forming large plate-like growths.