Potash mining

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Aerial view of the spoil dump (right in the picture) of the Sigmundshall potash mine in Bokeloh near Hanover .

As potash mining is underground mining of potash referred. The underground mining of potash and rock salt is summarized under the term salt mining .

Potash deposits

The mined potash deposits are always accompanied by sodium chloride and have a potash content of between 20 and 35%. Thus, per ton of potash extracted, several tons of spoil salt are produced, 96% of which consists of table salt. See also salt deposit .

Potash mining in Germany

The first potash mine in the world was the Royal Prussian Salt Mine in Staßfurt with the von der Heydt and von Manteuffel pits .

Potash mining concentrated on the Staßfurter Sattel for a long time. No other potash deposits were known until the exploration and extraction of potash salts in Mecklenburg began in 1874 (Lübenheen, Jessenitz, Conow). Commercial mining only began there at the turn of the century.

After it was known that potash salts could not only be found near Staßfurt, brisk drilling activity began throughout Germany, as a result of which many potash plants were founded. The Vienenburg potash plant that was then built was the first potash plant outside the Staßfurt saddle.

“[...] This was the starting point of a rapid development, during the course of which, up to the turn of the century, many mining companies were founded on German territory for the extraction and processing of potash salts. By July 1, 1907, a total of 58 fully operational potash shafts were already in place and 31 shafts were being sunk. "

- Loewe 1907

With the general mining law for the Prussian states of 1865 (AGB), everyone could speculate on mineral resources and thus "reserve" mine fields. In addition, many mining companies were actually founded - especially for potash salts - which resulted in a ruinous price war. In order to curb this uncontrolled growth, the law regarding the amendment of the General Mining Act of June 24, 1865/1892 of July 5, 1905 (G.-SS 265) (blocking the assumptions on coal and rock salt) , the so-called Lex Gamp , was passed in 1905 , because it went back on the initiative of the Prussian state parliament member Karl Gamp . Lex Gamp imposed a suspicion ban for a maximum of two years until a more far-reaching new regulation of the terms and conditions. As a result, a de facto state reservation was introduced and the natural resources were not free or, in the case of formerly land-owned natural resources, withdrawn from the landowner's power of disposal. The deadline was March 31, 1905, assumptions made before this date were excluded from the new regulation.

The amendment to the AGB suggested by Lex Gamp was then implemented in 1907 with the law of June 18, 1907, regarding the amendment of the General Mining Act of June 24, 1865 (GS 1907 p. 119). With this change, old rights were codfied as exceptions to the state reservation, so in Article VIII: "The provincial law provisions remain unaffected by the provisions in Article I of this law, according to which some of the minerals referred to in Article I are subject to the landowner's rights of disposal ..."

Until after the First World War , the German Reich had a worldwide monopoly on potash mining, which was only broken by the loss of the potash district in Alsace . During the Great Depression, the German Potash Indicator introduced the potash lot in order to limit the number of potash works. With the so-called Decommissioning Ordinance of 1921, a legal basis was created to reduce the number of potash mines. As expected, this led to a wave of concentration in the potash industry and the closure of numerous smaller plants. In 1938 this process of concentration was largely complete and six groups were formed that combined the potash industry. These were Wintershall AG, Salzdetfurth AG, Burbach Kali AG, Preussag, Kali-Chemie AG and Deutsche Solvay-Werke.

After the Second World War the potash mines in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany were nationalized; in the western zones they remained in private ownership. As a result of the reunification of Germany, VEB Kombinat Kali was converted from the Treuhandanstalt into Mitteldeutsche Kali AG and then merged with K + S AG . The potash contract was concluded for this purpose. The potash contract was confidential for a long time and only became public in 2014.

Potash districts in Germany

Potash mines in Germany

Worldwide potash production

Today the largest potassium chloride producers (potash industry) in the world are Canada, Russia and Germany. The only remaining German potash mining company is K + S AG .

environmental issues

Dismantling process

special procedures

literature

  • Otto Braitsch: Origin and stock of the salt deposits (=  mineralogy and petrography in single representations . Volume 3 ). Springer, Berlin / Göttingen / Heidelberg 1962.
  • D. Eckart: Current status and open problems of the safekeeping of decommissioned underground mining facilities . In: New mining technology . tape 11 , 1974, p. 842-848 .
  • Ernst Fulda: Overview of the salt deposits in Germany . In: Kali . tape 2 , 1925.
  • Eugen Geinitz: Geology of Mecklenburg . Hinstorff, Rostock 1922.
  • Werner Gimm (Ed.): Potash and rock salt mining . tape 1 . VEB German publishing house for basic industry, 1968.
  • Karl-Heinz Höfer: Basic problems of rock mechanics . Akademieverlag, Berlin 1965.
  • Karl-Heinz Höfer, Georg Bilkenroth: The strength and deformation behavior of carnallitite as a basis for assessing the stability of mine structures . In: New mining technology . tape 5 , 1975, p. 451-457 .
  • Hans Jendersie (Ed.): Potash and rock salt mining . tape 2 . VEB German publishing house for basic industry, Leipzig 1969.
  • Rudolf Junghans: Technology of potash and rock salt mining . VEB German publishing house for basic industry, Leipzig 1964.
  • Kast: Expert opinion on the security measures of decommissioned potash plants . tape 2 . Deutscher Kali-Verein, Berlin 1926 (State Main Archive Saxony-Anhalt, signature: F 38, Gen. VIIIg No. 64 Bd. 2).
  • Ernst Loock: Disused shafts - a problem for the potash industry . In: Freiberg research books . A 136th Academy, Berlin 1960, p. 57-64 .
  • Thomas Reuter: The shafts of potash mining in Germany . In: Stadtverwaltung Sondershausen (ed.): SONDERSHÄUSER HEFTE on the history of the potash industry . No. 13 . City administration Sondershausen, Department of Culture, Sondershausen 2009, ISBN 978-3-9811062-3-7 .
  • Horst Richter: Geological passport of the southwest Mecklenburg potash salt deposits . Rostock 1950 (unpublished report of the geological state institute of the GDR; specialist archive of the state office for the environment, nature conservation and geology Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania (LUNG MV), inventory signature KA0001).

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Rainer Slotta: 150 years of potash production in Germany. (PDF; 7.3MB) In: Potash and Rock Salt 3/2011. Pp. 20–39 , accessed March 27, 2014 .
  2. ^ Leo Loewe: The mining of potash salts . Festschrift for the X. General German Miners' Days in Eisenach. In: Germany's potash mining . 1907, p. 5 .
  3. ↑ Günter Pinzke: The salt mines of Mecklenburg . Books on Demand, 2014, ISBN 978-3-7357-3058-9 , 6.6 The shutdown of the work ( reading sample [accessed on February 13, 2018]).
  4. ↑ Gerhard Dapprich: Guide to mining law . and other areas of law with legal texts that are important for mining. Fourth, improved and enlarged edition. Glückauf, Essen 1955, p. 17-19 .
  5. ↑ Law on the amendment of the General Mining Act of June 24, 1865/1892 of July 5, 1905 . (G.-SS 265) (Blocking of speculations on hard coal and rock salt). In: Fritz Bennhold (Ed.): General mining law for the Prussian states: from June 24, 1865; taking into account its amendments and additions brought about by the legislation up to July 1, 1913, together with the appendix, containing the associated implementing provisions and the relevant Reich and state laws . Text output with note and subject reg. Baedeker, Essen 1914, Appendix II, p. 203, 204 ( uni-muenster.de [accessed February 13, 2018]).
  6. ↑ Gerhard Dapprich: Guide to mining law . and other areas of law with legal texts that are important for mining. Third, improved and enlarged edition. Glückauf, Essen 1953, p. 198 (Article I refers to §2 AGB in the version from 1913).
  7. ↑ Law of June 18, 1907, regarding the amendment of the General Mining Act (G.-SS 119), insofar as its provisions are not already incorporated into the text of the General Mining Act itself. In: Fritz Bennhold (Ed.): General mining law for the Prussian states: from June 24, 1865; taking into account its amendments and additions brought about by the legislation up to July 1, 1913, together with the appendix, containing the associated implementing provisions and the relevant Reich and state laws . Text output with note and subject reg. Baedeker, Essen 1914, Appendix II, p. 205–208 ( uni-muenster.de [accessed February 13, 2018]).
  8. ↑ Ordinance on the amendment of the regulations for the implementation of the law on the regulation of the potash industry of July 18, 1919, (Reichs-Gesetzbl. P. 663). of October 22, 1921
  9. ↑ Horst-Jürgen Herbert, Arnold Schwandt et al .: Saline solution inflows in the salt mining of Central Germany . Ed .: Society for Plant and Reactor Safety. 2007, ISBN 978-3-939355-00-7 , pp. 19–21 ( grs.de [PDF; accessed on February 14, 2018]).
  10. ↑ Potash contract
  11. ↑ Lieberknecht: Potash contract is disclosed to the state parliament , In: Thüringer Allgemeine Zeitung of March 25, 2014
  12. ↑ Internet Archive: Encyclopedia of Technical Chemistry . Berlin [etc.] Urban & Schwarzenberg, 1914-23, 1914 ( archive.org [accessed July 10, 2019]).