NCERT Book Class 10 Social Science (Geography) Chapter 5 Minerals and Energy Resources

Haban comes to Guwahati with his father A bright smile from toothpaste
from a remote village. and minerals
He sees people getting into strange Toothpaste cleans your teeth. Abrasive
house like objects which move along the minerals like silica, limestone, aluminium
road. He also sees a “kitchen” dragging a oxide and various phosphate minerals do the
number of house along with it. He is amazed cleaning. Fluoride which is used to reduce
and asked his father “Why don’t our houses cavities, comes from a mineral fluorite. Most
move like the one we saw in Guwahati, Ba?” toothpaste are made white with titanium
Ba replies, “These are not houses, they oxide, which comes from minerals called
are buses and trains. Unlike our houses these rutile, ilmenite and anatase. The sparkle in
are not made of bricks and stones, metal like some toothpastes comes from mica. The
iron and alluminium are used in making toothbrush and tube containing the paste are
these. They do not move on their own. They made of plastics from petroleum. Find out
are driven by an engine which needs energy where these minerals are found?
to work.”
Dig a little deeper and find out how many
We use different things in our daily life made minerals are used to make a light bulb?
from metal. Can you list a number of items
used in your house made of metals. Where do
All living things need minerals
these metals come from?
You have studied that the earth’s crust is Life processes cannot occur without minerals.
made up of different minerals embedded in the Although our mineral intake represents only
rocks. Various metals are extracted from these about 0.3 per cent of our total intake of
minerals after proper refinement. nutrients, they are so potent and so important
Minerals are an indispensable part of our that without them we would not be able to
lives. Almost everything we use, from a tiny pin utilise the other 99.7 per cent of foodstuffs.
to a towering building or a big ship, all are
made from minerals. The railway lines and the Dig a little deeper and collect “Nutritional
tarmac (paving) of the roads, our implements Facts” printed on food labels.
and machinery too are made from minerals.
Cars, buses, trains, aeroplanes are What is a mineral?
manufactured from minerals and run on Geologists define mineral as a
power resources derived from the earth. Even “homogenous, naturally occurring substance
the food that we eat contains minerals. In all with a definable internal structure.” Minerals
stages of development, human beings have are found in varied forms in nature, ranging
used minerals for their livelihood, decoration, from the hardest diamond to the softest talc.
festivities, religious and ceremonial rites. Why are they so varied?