[1] They are used in their natural state or after beneficiation either as raw materials or as additives in a wide range of applications.
Typical examples of industrial rocks and minerals are limestone, clays, sand, gravel, diatomite, kaolin, bentonite, silica, barite, gypsum, and talc.
Some examples of applications for industrial minerals are construction, ceramics, paints, electronics, filtration, plastics, glass, detergents and paper.
In some cases, even organic materials (peat) and industrial products or by-products (cement, slag, silica fume) are categorized under industrial minerals, as well as metallic compounds mainly utilized in non-metallic form (as an example most titanium is utilized as an oxide TiO2 rather than Ti metal).
The evaluation of raw materials to determine their suitability for use as industrial minerals requires technical test-work, mineral processing trials and end-product evaluation; free to download evaluation manuals are available for the following industrial minerals: limestone, flake graphite, diatomite, kaolin, bentonite and construction materials.