How do I find out what is anomalous values as oposed to background values?
Well, in very general terms there are compilations that present average values for different rock types. Probably have a fairly gross overview in your introductory geochemistry text book; some sort of tables that give average or typical values for the elements in different rock types. There are many publications that present similar data, perhaps even one or several applicable to your area of interest. Gotta do some research in that case. In practice, in the particular case, such generic values are not very useful, and you would need to have a statistical evaluation of element variation in the particular rock to establish “anomalous”. As to anomalous versus mineable, they are not the same. Mineable implies a cost effective extraction-a rock is only mineable if you will make money by the process of mining and processing the material to a sellable product. And this depends on many factors, not least of which is the going price for the purified commodity, which changes quite a bit over ti
