Steve Reynolds, Ph.D., “Untangling the stratigraphy of the upper Paleozoic Supai and Naco Groups of the Mogollon Escarpment,” recorded 3 Dec. 2024. The 67-minute presentation includes 20-minutes of Q&A
Guido Merino and Priscilla R. Martinez
On 4 December 2024, the AGS Scholarship Committee 2024 announced the awardees of the J. Harold Courtright ($3,000) and the M. Lee Allison ($3,000) scholarships. This year’s review committee comprised Sterling Cook (AGS Councilor) and Michael McCarrel (AGS Secretary). Sterling was on hand to present the awards.
Guido Merino
The winner of the J. Harold Courtright scholarship, which focuses on economic geology, is Guido Merino. Guido is an M.S. candidate at the University of Arizona working on the ore chemistry of an epithermal-porphyry system in the Vicuna Belt of Argentina. He earned an Honors Degree in Geological Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires in July 2017.
Priscilla R. Martinez
The winner of the M. Lee Allison scholarship, Priscilla R. Martinez, is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Arizona. Her dissertation research involves an interdisciplinary study to characterize the interplay between Cenozoic climatic-biotic events and Andean volcanism along the western South American margin.
Priscilla earned a B.S. in Geology at California State University- Northridge in 2022, and M.S. in Geology from California State University-Fullerton.
Born on January 12, 1932 in Spokane, Washington, Ted Eyde recently passed away in Tucson on November 15, 2024 at the age of 92. Ted graduated from Montana College of Mineral Science and Technology with a Master's degree in Geological Engineering (1957), a field he dedicated over six decades of his life.
Ted was an active member in the mining industry and affiliated with numerous professional organizations; including the Mining Metallurgy and Exploration of AIME, the Tucson Section of the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical, and Petroleum Engineers, Southwestern Minerals Exploration Association, Arizona Council of Engineering and Scientific Associations, American Institute of Professional Geologists, Arizona Geological Society, and New Mexico Geological Society. He was an expert in his field with over seventy publications and discovered one of the world’s largest zeolite (i.e., chabazite) deposits north of Bowie, Arizona in 1961 while working for Union Carbide.
A lifetime member, Ted joined the Arizona Geological Society in 1959, and served on its Investment Committee. He was instrumental in getting the Arizona Geological Society’s two scholarship funds separated from the general fund, insuring the interest from these investments would fund all future scholarships. Ted also authored two AGS industrial minerals field trip guidebooks in 1986 and 1992.
A Funeral Mass will be held on December 7, 2024, at 10:30 a.m. at St. Odilia Church, 7570 N. Paseo del Norte, Oro Valley, Arizona.
Arizona’s Role in the Green Energy Transition, Strategic/Critical Minerals, How they will be Sourced - Or Ramblings on Critical Minerals and Thoughts Thereof by Carson A. Richardson, Senior Research Scientist, Arizona Geological Survey, University
Critical and strategic minerals have been buzzy terms in the news in the last few years, but have an often-ignored history that stretches clearly back to World War I. Critical mineral topics have been receiving bipartisan support from Congress as sourcing them addresses multiple needs. For one, in the United States, we are dependent on imports of critical minerals from other countries to meet 50% to 100% of total domestic demand for almost all critical minerals. Thus, many of these supply chains are vulnerable to disruption from geopolitics, social upheaval, and other unexpected events. Additionally, the renewable (or green) energy transition away from fossil fuels to reduce carbon footprints and combat climate change will require huge amounts of metals compared to current levels. There are simply not enough active mines or emerging deposits of many of the critical minerals to meet projected global demand.
This talk will: 1) sift through the jargon around critical and strategic minerals and materials; 2) provide a survey of the history of critical and strategic minerals in the United States; 3) an overview of the known critical mineral deposits in Arizona with primary critical mineral ores and those with potential to produce byproduct critical mineral ores; and 4) future demand scenarios and how the United States could work to meet these demands.
Field Trip Participants at Discovery Outcrop of Cactus
(Sacaton) Deposit
The recent field trip to visit the Santa Cruz and Cactus (Sacaton) porphyry copper deposits of the Casa Grande area was a great success. AGS Executive Committee thanks Ralph Stegan for organizing the trip and the staffs of the Ivanhoe Electric and Arizona Sonoran Copper Company for providing tours of their deposits. An excellent field guide, which can be viewed at this link.
Postfire debris-flow research at Arizona Geological Survey: Efforts to improve hazard assessments by Ann Youberg and Becky Beers (AZGS Research Scientists).
They discuss how wildfires impact the landscape to increase the likelihood of postfire debris flows and floods; the transient nature of fire impacts on the landscape; the challenges of mitigating these hazards in areas where fire season and monsoon overlap; and projects the AZGS and Geosciences are conducting to address these issues. We’ll close with an ongoing case study assessing the effectiveness of novel mitigation strategies deployed in northern Arizona.
