Salt mining extracts natural salt deposits from underground. The mined salt is usually in the form of halite (commonly known as rock salt), and extracted from evaporite formations .
8-590: Sifto Canada , Sifto Salt , or simply Sifto Salt Canada is a salt mining and marketing company based in Canada, with its primary products being table salt , fine evaporated salt, water conditioning salt, agricultural salt, and highway deicing salt. Sifto Canada is wholly owned by Compass Minerals . Sifto was founded by Sam Platt who was prospecting for oil in 1866, and instead of oil encountered rock salt in Goderich Harbour on Lake Huron . Sifto Canada
16-472: The Song dynasty , a well with a diameter about the size of a bowl and several dozen feet deep was drilled for salt production . In Southwestern China, natural salt deposits were mined with bores that could reach to a depth of more than 1,000 m (3,300 ft), but the yields of salt were relatively low. As salt is a necessity of life, salt mining played a pivotal role as one of the most important sources of
24-544: The Imperial Chinese government's revenue and state development. Most modern salt mines are privately operated or operated by large multinational companies such as K+S , AkzoNobel , Cargill , and Compass Minerals . Some notable salt mines include: In slang, the term salt mines , and especially the phrase back to the salt mines , refers ironically to one's workplace, or a dull or tedious task. This phrase originates from c. 1800 in reference to
32-472: The evaporation plants in Goderich, Unity, and Amherst have the capacity to produce a total of more than 470,000 tons. It is the largest underground salt mine in the world. Salt mining Before the advent of the modern internal combustion engine and earth-moving equipment, mining salt was one of the most expensive and dangerous of operations because of rapid dehydration caused by constant contact with
40-567: The salt (both in the mine passages and scattered in the air as salt dust) and of other problems caused by accidental excessive sodium intake. Salt is now plentiful, but until the Industrial Revolution , it was difficult to come by, and salt was often mined by slaves or prisoners. Life expectancy for the miners was low. The earliest found salt mine was in Hallstatt, Austria where salt was mined, starting in 5000BC. Ancient China
48-439: The techniques of producing salt. Salt mining was an arduous task for them, as they faced geographical and technological constraints. Salt was extracted mainly from the sea, and salt works in the coastal areas in late imperial China equated to more than 80 percent of national production. The Chinese made use of natural crystallization of salt lakes and constructed some artificial evaporation basins close to shore. In 1041, during
56-515: Was among the earliest civilizations in the world with cultivation and trade in mined salt. They first discovered natural gas when they excavated rock salt. The Chinese writer, poet, and politician Zhang Hua of the Jin dynasty wrote in his book Bowuzhi how people in Zigong , Sichuan , excavated natural gas and used it to boil a rock salt solution. The ancient Chinese gradually mastered and advanced
64-540: Was formed in 1950 and the company was acquired by the United States chemical company Compass Minerals in the 1990s. The Goderich mine developed into the largest salt mine in Canada and remains a key source of salt for the company. In addition to distribution facilities across the country, Sifto Canada operates the following production facilities: The Goderich salt mine has a production capacity of 9 million tons per year, and produces 7,250,000 tons per year, while
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