Houyu Cu-Mo deposit, Yangyan river valley, Fanshi Co., Xinzhou, Shanxi, Chinai

Regional Level Types
Houyu Cu-Mo deposit	Deposit
Yangyan river valley	Valley
Fanshi Co.	County
Xinzhou	Prefecture-level City
Shanxi	Province
China	Country

The Houyu Mo-polymetallic deposit contains proven reserves of 160, 000 tons of Mo, 2.27 tons of Au, 85, 000 tons of Cu, and 6, 125 tons of Ga. The average grades for these elements are 0.054 %, 11.60 g/t, 0.03 % and 0.0023 %, respectively. The exposed stratigraphic units consist of Precambrian metamorphic basement, Proterozoic and Lower Paleozoic marine sedimentary rocks. The oldest rocks in this region are the Taihuai subgroup of Upper Achaean Wutai Group, which is an intermediate to felsic meta-volcanics assemblage, primarily consisting of meta- basement conglomerate, sericite schists, chlorite-actinolite schists and magnetite quartzites interbedded with marbles and quartzites. Quartzite is exposed in the central and southern parts of the district, with a relatively consistent thickness of around 8 m. The limestone is primarily located in the central mining area and is characterized by thick-layered massive dolomitic limestone and siliceous strip limestone, with a total thickness of 110 m. Due to the Cretaceous granitic magmatism, contact metasomatism occurred, resulting in the formation of skarn belts, marble belts, and silicified limestone belts. Moving on to the Cambrian strata, they are exposed in the western and northern parts of the district. From bottom to top, these strata include bottom conglomerate, shale and marl, sticky slate, horn shale, and oolitic limestone.
A total of three ore bodies have been explored in the mine area. Among them, the largest are No. 1 and No. 2 ore bodies. These ore bodies do not show any selectivity to the surrounding rocks. They are primarily found in Archean biotite plagioclase gneiss and diorite, with some occurrences in Early Cretaceous quartz porphyry, granite porphyry, and brecciated porphyry. The ore bodies are shallowly buried, with the main ore body being buried between 20–400 m. The orebodies are gentle with angle at 5-15°. The average thickness of the three industrial ore bodies in the area is 7.40 m. The Houyu Mo deposit exhibits skarnization, silicification, sericitization, kaolinization, chloritization, epidotization and carbonatation.

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References