RARE EARTH ELEMENTS EXPLORATION STUDY USING REFLECTANCE SPECTROSCOPY: CASE STUDY USING SAMPLE FROM PT TIMAH TBK

• Main Author: GUNAWAN (NIM : 12113030), STEVEN
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/24392
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Rare Earth Elements (REE) are a set of 17 (seventeen) chemical elements in the periodic table, specifically the 15 (fifteen) lanthanides, as well as scandium and yttrium. They are all metals and usually occur together in the earth’s crust. REE are an important source of electronic components in our live. One of the main drawback from REE mining is that although they are abundant in the earth’s crust, they do not occur economically enough to be mined. Like all other materials in the world, REE has a distinctive characteristic that allows them to be detected using reflectance spectroscopy. Reflectance spectroscopy is the study of light as a function of wavelength that has been reflected from a material. Every material has a unique characteristic to this reaction in the form of specific reflectance value in the 3502500 nm wavelength. Mineral identification using reflectance spectroscopy utilizes ASD FieldSpec4 as a spectrometer and SPECMIN as an identification program. These data are verified using several analysis namely X-Ray Fluorescence, Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry and microscopic observation. Data obtained through reflectance spectroscopy was in the form of spectral composition and needed smoothing in the 350 – 380 nm wavelength range. There are 12 samples in total analyzed through reflectance spectroscopy to make a database of REE spectral composition for later use in remote sensing the area. These samples originated from PT Timah Tbk tin mining area in the Bangka Island. The result from this study shows indication of rare earth minerals in samples PML-05, PML18, and PML-19. These identified rare earth minerals are allanite, titanite/sphene and monazite. Reflectance spectroscopy analysis using ASD FieldSpec4 can be used to identify the mineral association in on field samples practically, and accurately.