GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION OF METAL AND INDUSTRIAL MINERALS OCCURRENCES IN TRANS-PECOS TEXAS AND BORDER REGIONS: A GOOGLE EARTH® DATABASE AND COMPILATION

Despite favorable geology and diverse metal and industrial mineral prospects in Trans-Pecos Texas, this 30,000+ square mile area remains underexplored relative to similar geologic terranes of the western United States. The reasons for this situation are complex, including the paucity of public land available for mineral entry, but another reason is the lack of a geospatial database of known mineral deposits that would facilitate exploration activity.

The Texas Bureau of Economic Geology published an excellent compilation of Trans-Pecos Texas mineral occurrences (Price et al., 1983) that predates the digital information age, thus hampering its ready use by geospatial databases. We converted the Price et al. (1983) location information into spreadsheet format, including coordinate information in latitude-longitude and UTM coordinates and with general elevation information extracted from Google Earth® for the plotted position. Additional information provided by studies since the early 1980’s was incorporated, as well as a few prospects not included in the original study. Because geological and mineral resource provinces are not terminated at political boundaries, selected mineral deposits in the border regions of contiguous New Mexico to the north and Coahuila and Chihuahua to the south and southwest of Trans-Pecos Texas were added. The border region is not defined as a precise area, but more as a zone where geologic or geographic features essentially straddle the state or international boundary. Prospect information was coded by the following commodities or groups: polymetallic I (Cu, Zn, Pb, Ag, Au), polymetallic II (Mo, Sn, W), mercury, manganese, uranium, fluorspar, sulfur, barite, talc, and undifferentiated industrial minerals. A few coal prospects are included as undifferentiated industrial minerals.

This product is intended to serve as a complement to the Price et al. (1983) database, and readers are referred to the original compilation for specific information about individual occurrences, including the original sources of geologic and other information. A list of general references is included, with emphasis on new information since the early 1980’s. The GoogleEarth product and supporting information can be accessed at http://www.beg.utexas.edu/transpecos/index.htm.