Intrepid Potash, Inc. (), based in

Denver, Colorado Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of ...

, is a fertilizer manufacturer. The company is the largest producer of

potassium chloride Potassium chloride (KCl, or potassium salt) is a metal halide salt composed of potassium and chlorine. It is odorless and has a white or colorless vitreous crystal appearance. The solid dissolves readily in water, and its solutions have a sa ...

, also known as muriate of potash, in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. It owns three mines, all in the

Western U.S. The Western United States (also called the American West, the Western States, the Far West, the Western territories, and the West) is census regions United States Census Bureau As American settlement in the U.S. expanded westward, the mea ...

, near the cities of

Carlsbad, New Mexico Carlsbad ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Eddy County, New Mexico, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city population was 32,238. Carlsbad is centered at the intersection of U.S. Routes 62/ 180 and 285, and is the principal city ...

Moab, Utah Moab () is the largest city in and the county seat of Grand County in eastern Utah in the western United States, known for its dramatic scenery. The population was 5,366 at the 2020 census. Moab attracts many tourists annually, mostly visitor ...

, and

Wendover, Utah Wendover is a city on the western edge of Tooele County, Utah, Tooele County, Utah, United States. The population was 1,115 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. Description Wendover is on the western border of Utah and is contiguous ...

Mines

Carlsbad

There are three sites approximately East of Carlsbad, New Mexico. The East facility produces

sylvite Sylvite, or sylvine, is potassium chloride (KCl) in natural mineral form. It forms crystals in the isometric system very similar to normal rock salt, halite ( NaCl). The two are, in fact, isomorphous. Sylvite is colorless to white with shades ...

and

langbeinite Langbeinite is a potassium magnesium sulfate mineral with the chemical formula K2Mg2(SO4)3. Langbeinite crystallizes in the isometric-tetartoidal (cubic) system as transparent colorless or white with pale tints of yellow to green and violet cry ...

potash, and is capable of fully processing its ore to the storage or shipment stage. The West facility (currently shut down) produced mainly traditional

potash Potash ( ) includes various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water- soluble form.

, which is shipped by truck to be processed at the North facility for final storage or shipping.

Moab

The Moab or Kane Creek potash mine () is located along the

right Rights are law, legal, social, or ethics, ethical principles of freedom or Entitlement (fair division), entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal sy ...

(northwest) bank of the

Colorado River The Colorado River () is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The river, the List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem), 5th longest in the United St ...

, about 20 miles (30 km) west of

,Intrepid Potash: Moab, Utah
accessed June 2008 at the south end of State Route 279 and the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad is a Railroad classes, Class I freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Pacific is the second largest railroad in the United Stat ...

. The location is known as Potash on

U.S. Geological Survey The United States Geological Survey (USGS), founded as the Geological Survey, is an agency of the U.S. Department of the Interior whose work spans the disciplines of biology, geography, geology, and hydrology. The agency was founded on March ...

(USGS)

topographic map In modern mapping, a topographic map or topographic sheet is a type of map characterized by large- scale detail and quantitative representation of relief features, usually using contour lines (connecting points of equal elevation), but histori ...

s, and is east of Dead Horse Point State Park and

Canyonlands National Park Canyonlands National Park is a national park of the United States located in southeastern Utah near the town of Moab. The park preserves a colorful landscape eroded into numerous canyons, mesas, and buttes by the Colorado River, the Green Rive ...

Google Maps Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application offered by Google. It offers satellite imagery, aerial photography, street maps, 360° interactive panorama, interactive panoramic views of streets (Google Street View, Street View ...

street maps and

USGS The United States Geological Survey (USGS), founded as the Geological Survey, is an government agency, agency of the United States Department of the Interior, U.S. Department of the Interior whose work spans the disciplines of biology, geograp ...

s, accessed June 2008 vi
ACME Mapper
/ref> According to USGS reports, the Paradox Basin contains up to 2.0 billion tons (1.8 billion metric tonnes) of potash, with the primary mine being the one at Kane Creek. The plant was built by the Texas Gulf Sulphur Company in the early 1960s, opening in 1963 as a conventional

underground mine Mining is the extraction of valuable geological materials and minerals from the surface of the Earth. Mining is required to obtain most materials that cannot be grown through agricultural processes, or feasibly created artificially in a la ...

. Later that year, an explosion trapped 25 miners, of whom only seven were able to survive, by building a barricade to trap fresh air. In 1970, operations were changed to a system that combines

solution mining In-situ leaching (ISL), also called in-situ recovery (ISR) or solution mining, is a mining process used to recover minerals such as copper and uranium through boreholes drilled into a deposit, ''in situ''. In-situ leach works by artificially dis ...

and solar

evaporation Evaporation is a type of vaporization that occurs on the Interface (chemistry), surface of a liquid as it changes into the gas phase. A high concentration of the evaporating substance in the surrounding gas significantly slows down evapora ...

. River water is pumped into the mine and dissolves the potash, after which the

brine Brine (or briny water) is a high-concentration solution of salt (typically sodium chloride or calcium chloride) in water. In diverse contexts, ''brine'' may refer to the salt solutions ranging from about 3.5% (a typical concentration of seawat ...

solution is pumped to

evaporation pond Evaporation ponds are artificial ponds with very large surface areas that are designed to efficiently evaporate water by sunlight and expose water to the ambient temperatures. Evaporation ponds are inexpensive to design making them ideal for mul ...

s. Intrepid bought the mine in 2000 from the

Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan The Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan, also known as PotashCorp, was a company based in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. The company merged with Calgary-based Agrium to form Nutrien, in a transaction that closed on January 1, 2018. The company was th ...

, which had bought Texas Gulf in 1995.

Wendover

The Wendover potash mine is located about 120 miles west of Salt Lake City, Utah, and has been actively used for potash production since 1917. Potash production from natural occurring brines at the Wendover facility dates back to World War I. During the period from 1920 to 1936, a number of unsuccessful attempts were made to commercially produce potash. By 1939, a successful commercial potash operation was achieved and is still in production.

Lobbying

In 2015, a law firm associated with former U.S. Senator

Norm Coleman Norman Bertram Coleman Jr. (born August 17, 1949) is an American politician, attorney, and lobbyist. From 2003 to 2009, he served as a United States Senate, United States Senator for Minnesota. From 1994 to 2002, he was mayor of Saint Paul, Mi ...

started lobbying the U.S. State Department on behalf of Intrepid Potash to increase sanctions against

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

. In 2021, the United States sanctioned Belarusian potash firms, raising potash prices worldwide.

References

External links

{{authority control Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange Companies based in Denver Fertilizer companies of the United States Mining companies of the United States