Twelve stories, plus five on current events

The world runs on rock

Every chip, battery, phone and power line starts in a mine. Each story takes one thing apart in 3D, down to its atoms, then follows its metals around the globe to the mines, refineries and export rules behind them. Every figure is sourced.

01The Chipthe minerals inside every computer chipgallium, germanium, silicon 02The Mindthe metal and power behind AIthe chips, copper and power behind AI 03The Batteryinside a lithium-ion celllithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite 04The Magnetrare earths that turn power into motionneodymium, dysprosium 05The Rocketthe metals that survive launchaluminium-lithium, niobium, steel 06The Signalthe glass and metal under the seagermanium, glass, copper 07The Shieldthe minor metals defence depends ongallium, tungsten, antimony 08The Bodythe metals inside medicinehelium, niobium-titanium, titanium 09The Enginethe jet engine's hottest metalsnickel, rhenium, titanium 10The Gridcopper, the metal of electricitycopper, silver, silicon steel 11The Screenthe rare elements in a phoneindium, tin, tantalum 12The Mapevery story on one globeevery story, one globe

Current events

The same approach applied to the news: the minerals behind a war, a rocket company, the seabed, an ice-covered island and a town moved for the iron beneath it.

13The Drone Warminerals behind the dronesrare-earth magnets, lithium, glass fibre 14SpaceXthe metals behind Starship and Starlinksteel, copper, argon, gallium 15The Deepthe race for metal on the seabednickel, cobalt, manganese, copper 16The IceGreenland's rare earthsrare earths, zirconium, niobium, uranium 17The TownKiruna, moved for the iron underneathiron ore, phosphorus, rare earths

Our other series

Mining history, in numbers

The hill that became the Big Hole, the gold rushes, the silver mountain of Potosí, the deepest copper pits and Congo cobalt, plus 2.4 million drill holes under Western Australia.

The Big Hole at Kimberley, South Africa, seen from above, with water at the bottomMining historyThe Big Hole, KimberleyDiamonds · South AfricaThe Super Pit gold mine at Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, at sunsetMining historyGold rushes, then and nowGold and lithium · WorldwideCerro Rico rising above the rooftops of Potosí, BoliviaMining historyPotosí, the mountain of silverSilver · BoliviaThe Chuquicamata copper mine in Chile's Atacama Desert, photographed from the International Space StationMining historyThe biggest copper pitsCopper · Utah and ChileGreen malachite on pink cobaltocalcite, a copper and cobalt specimen from Musonoi near KolweziMining historyCongo's copper and cobaltCopper and cobalt · DR CongoThe Kiruna iron ore mine drawn in 3D: the ore body dipping under the town, its levels and shafts, at the moment of the nightly blastData storyA day in the life of a mine3D · Kiruna, SwedenGold drill-hole columns rising over the Yilgarn goldfields on a satellite map of Western AustraliaData storyUnder Western AustraliaDrill holes · Western AustraliaCopper drill-hole columns over South Australia on a satellite mapData storyUnder South AustraliaDrill holes · South AustraliaCopper drill-hole columns over the Cobar Basin on a satellite map of New South WalesData storyUnder New South WalesDrill holes · New South WalesGold drill-hole columns over the Northern Territory on a satellite mapData storyUnder the Northern TerritoryDrill holes · Northern TerritoryGold drill-hole columns over central Victoria on a satellite mapData storyUnder VictoriaDrill holes · VictoriaDrill holes coloured by year across western Tasmania on a satellite mapData storyUnder TasmaniaDrill holes · TasmaniaGold drill-hole columns over the Abitibi on a satellite map of QuébecData storyUnder QuébecDrill holes · QuébecDrill holes coloured by year across Finland and Sweden on a satellite mapData storyUnder the Nordic shieldDrill holes · Finland and SwedenUranium drill-hole columns over the Athabasca Basin on a satellite map of SaskatchewanData storyUnder SaskatchewanDrill holes · SaskatchewanPalladium drill intervals under farmland at Gonneville, Western Australia, in 3DData storyGonneville, hole by holeDiscovery replay · Western AustraliaA block of ground cut out under the Kalgoorlie Super Pit, its drill holes hanging beneath the satellite pictureData storyWhat's beneath your feet?Interactive 3D · anywhere

Cover photos from Wikimedia Commons: The Big Hole by Rudolph Botha, CC BY-SA 3.0; Super Pit, Kalgoorlie by Kgbo, CC BY-SA 4.0; Cerro Rico over Potosí by Jbmurray, CC BY-SA 4.0; Chuquicamata from the ISS by Alexander Gerst (ESA), CC BY-SA 2.0; Malachite on cobaltocalcite, Musonoi by Ji-Elle, CC BY-SA 3.0.

Shares of world output come from USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries via our minerals data. Photos: NASA, NOAA and USGS, public domain; Kiruna Church by TorbjørnS on Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0. The 3D models are illustrations, not engineering drawings.