Geology and Ore 37, 2025

Pegmatites and their potential for mineral exploitation in Greenland

Pegmatites are important suppliers of many commodities world wide. In Greenland pegmatites are well- known, but their economic potential has only been explored at a few localities. This review provides an over- view of the genesis and general economic potential of pegmatite occurrences in Greenland. Field observations, archive information, geochemical analyses on a small selection of peg matites as well as maps of stream sediment samples that are enriched in elements characteristic of pegmatites are the base for the presentation. The prospective areas for pegmatite-hosted mineral occurrences in Greenland are outlined, and examples of prominent pegmatite minerals are demonstrated.

Introduction

Pegmatites are suppliers of critical raw materials like beryllium, lithium and tantalum. Pegmatites also represent an important source of gemstones such as emerald and tourmaline, and some are even mined for their large, clean crys tals of quartz and feldspar. Pegmatites are abundant in Greenland, but few have been described or studied in detail and hence their economic potential is still little known at present.

In a broader sense, the term pegmatite is used for any coarse-grained vein of granitic composition, with or without a connection to an intrusive complex. Medium- to coarse-grained granitic to pegmatitic veins may be derived from partial melting of their host rocks during progressive high-grade meta morphism. Such veins are also termed migmatitic veins.

Mineralogically, pegmatites are termed simple when they essentially consist  of quartz, feldspar and biotite, and complex when they carry a range of
accessory minerals like tourmaline, fluorite, lepidolite, spodumene or beryl. Also molybdenite, scheelite, uraninite and rare earth element-bearing miner als may occur in complex pegmatites.

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