A study of distribution regularity and exploitation techniques of potash and boron resources in countries of "One Belt, One Road"

With the rapid development of economy in China, the demand for potash salt is rising rapidly. Although there are rich potash resources all over the world, the distribution is uneven in that they are mainly distributed in North America and the Europe. After referring to a large number of data, the authors have made a preliminary estimation of potash resources in the countries of "One Belt, One Road", which reach about 11.2 billion tons (in terms of K₂O equivalent). The total reserves are dominated by six major potashforming basins, i.e., Qaidam Basin, Tarim Basin, Khorat Basin (including Sakon Nakhon Basin), Central Asian basin, Dead Sea Basin and Nepa Basin. The global boron resources are not evenly-distributed, with 73% reserves and 70% reserve bases dispersed in the USA, Turkish, Russia and Kazakhstan. There are abundant boron resources in the countries of "One Belt, One Road", mainly distributed in Russia, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Serbia and some other countries. According to the data published by US Geological Survey (USGS) in 2014, the world's proven reserves of boron are about 243 million tons. The authors have estimated that total boron resource reserves in the countries of "One Belt, One Road" come up to 146 million tons, accounting for about 69.5 percent of the world reserves. The authors made a detailed statistical analysis of distribution of potash and boron resources in the countries of "One Belt, One Road", gave an overview of the geological characteristics of typical deposits, described the exploitation techniques for pot-ash and boron, and discussed the preferred areas for using foreign potash and boron resources, thus providing useful information for Chinese enterprises' "going out" policy.