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NEW MEXICO AND ARIZONA LAND COMPANY, LLC "NZ"
"Nothing more powerfully creates heritage than the imaginative use and stewardship of land." --- Frank Lloyd Wright
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NZ Travertine, LLCA large world-class quality travertine deposit is located in Mesa del Oro, New Mexico (over 1.2 Billion Tons!) This may be the largest of its kind in the country.
Chemical analyses have been run from cores, cutting and hand samples by many different investigators. There is a striking uniformity to all these analyses, and all indicate high calcium, or chemical grade, limestone. Common variety limestones occur either in the subsurface or at the surface on all of NZ's checkerboard tracts. Economically important occurrences are limited to New Mexico - particularly Cibola County. The Madera (Pennsylvanian Age) and San Andres (Permian Age) marine limestones crop out across NZ's checkerboard minerals in Valencia County, New Mexico. They are a target for oil exploration but not limestone production. A massive travertine limestone (Cenozoic Age) is found at Mesa del Oro in Cibola County, New Mexico. This limestone was reprecipitated from the older limestones, and it is of high chemical purity. Analyses consistently show over 95% CaCO3 content, with relatively low magnesium and other impurities. Limestone is the basic constituent of cement and lime. It is also useful to acid neutralization, paper processing, and more recently, flue gas desulphurization. In addition to such chemical uses, limestone may be utilized as road metal.
Travertine is also used as a dimension stone in architectural
In general, commercial limestone production is highly sensitive to available transportation facilities and proximity to consumption. The Cibola County travertine is the most likely economic deposit from NZ's checkerboard mineral estate. In the fall of 1981, NZ granted Sunbelt, a wholly owned subsidiary of Public Service Company of New Mexico, a one year option to lease the entire deposit. With the claims, this came to some 8,800 acres. Sunbelt's interest was twofold: 1) the planned Four Corners Station, later called Dineh Power Plant, was to use limestone scrubbing; 2) the utility was diversifying into real estate, mining, venture capital, and other business area. The following text is an excerpt from the Sunbelt Mining Company, Inc. Mesa del Oro Limestone Project, Reserve Determination report.
In Summary, Sunbelt Mining Company, Inc., has analyzed the viability of certain limestone leases presented in the lease option agreement dated September 15, 1981 (Exhibit I) with NZ. Sunbelt conducted a field exploration program in May and July of 1982 completing 10 drill holes. Quality samples were obtained from the limestone core in drill hole number 50. Drilling penetrated 206.4" of solid, massive limestone. Four core samples were selected at intervals demonstrating greatest visual and textural variability. These four samples were sent to Fuller Company for analyses on May 20, 1982. Fuller crushed and split each sample and returned to the unused half to Sunbelt. The split from Sample #2 was sent to Hazen Research, Inc. and tested to confirm procedures and results obtained from Fuller." As dimension stone, this deposit would have a retail value of over $2 Trillion. The calcium carbonate material is also used for cement, lime, road-base stabilizer, and flue gas scrubber material for coal-fired power plants (it removes the sulfur that causes acid-rain). NZ is concluding their homework on this deposit and have resolved the following: 1. Travertine is mined Mexico and Turkey at much lower labor costs; 2. The Italians started selling high technology rock fabrication equipment to these countries to automate their quarries and fabrication plants; 3. The market in the US is mostly time sensitive custom stone fabrication. NZ toured one of the largest plants in Belen, New Mexico on October 2, 2003. The conclusion is that mining the travertine for industrial purposes is a much larger opportunity than a dimension stone facility. However, it seems that a dimension stone quarry could produce an income of $250,000 per year profit if done carefully and maintained at a smaller scale. NZ has a lessee that pays $.50 per ton or 5% royalty whichever is greater. If the deposit is used and depleted for a lower value industrial application it would still payout over $200 Million. In February 2004, NZ enlisted Pincock, Allen & Holt, mineral experts to evaluate and review the travertine mineral files. Their conclusions are summarized in a report. Torreon, Mexico trip - March 2004The NZ management team traveled to Torreon, Mexico after visiting Pisa, Italy in November 2003 to learn more about dimension stone manufacturing. The huge lesson on the trip was the simple quarrying methods:
The small crew of four men in Torreon, Mexico is able to remove several blocks per week and sell them to Italy for a nice profit. NZ will work with Jim Harrison, Mesa del Oro quarry manager, to cut a nice face in the Mesa del Oro quarry to see if we have the material the world wants for dimension stone. NZ plans to ship the first blocks to Torreon to fabricate the finished goods and test the market.
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