The Nonesuch Formation has been a major source of
copper, and is considered a prospective source of
petroleum.
Copper Copper was discovered in the Nonesuch in the 1800s, but early mining efforts, such as those at the
Nonesuch Mine in
Ontonagon County, Michigan, failed because of the difficulty of recovering the fine grains of
native copper. The
Copper Range Company opened the
White Pine mine in
Ontonagon County, Michigan, in 1955. The principal ore minerals were
chalcocite and
native copper. The underground mine produced copper from the Nonesuch Shale until it closed in 1995.
Petroleum The Nonesuch Shale has sufficient organic carbon content (greater than 0.5%) to be considered a potential
sourcebed for petroleum. Oil identified as
Precambrian has been found seeping into the White Pine copper mine in Michigan. Exploration wells have been drilled to Nonesuch-equivalent sediments in the rift basins in Michigan,
Wisconsin, and
Iowa, but no commercial petroleum deposits have been discovered. ==See also==