All elements and conditions, as well as phenomena and bodies of nature, can be used in public production to meet the material, cultural, and scientific needs of society and constitute its raw material and energy base, which are called natural resources.
All human life and activity, territorial settlement, and placement of productive forces depend on the quantity, quality, and location of natural resources.
What is the availability of the most important of them, and how long will they last? It is impossible to answer this question accurately and unequivocally.
All attempts to make such forecasts have mostly ended in failure. According to some calculations made in the mid-20th century, by the end of it, reserves of such essential minerals as lead, zinc, tin, fluorine, etc., were supposed to be exhausted. As we can see, this did not happen, so let us hope that the forecasts predicting the complete exhaustion of all metal reserves by 2500 are also erroneous. However, in any case, these reserves are limited and require reasonable management.
The classification of natural resources presents great theoretical and practical interest, allowing for the assessment of the scale of their reserves, the possibility of use, and a set of necessary measures for their protection and rational use.
Natural resources are classified according to the following criteria:
• By their use: production (agricultural and industrial), recreational, aesthetic, scientific, etc.;
• By belonging to certain components of nature: land, water, mineral, animal and plant worlds, etc.;
• By substitutability: substitutable (for example, fuel and energy resources can be replaced by wind or solar energy) and non-substitutable (oxygen - air for breathing or fresh water for drinking cannot be replaced).
Natural resources are conventionally divided into exhaustible and inexhaustible based on their nature of use. (D.L. Armand, 1966, A.M. Ryabchikov et al. 1979, 1986). Exhaustible resources are those that are completely consumed and depleted during use. They include the overwhelming majority of minerals, mining materials, and minerals formed in the geological history of the Earth.
Exhaustible resources are divided into:
• Non-renewable, formed in the Earth's crust over very distant periods of many millions of years; ore and non-ore minerals; the protection of these resources comes down to economical consumption and exploration of new reserves. Moreover, economical consumption implies not a reduction in extraction but its rationalization - preventing losses during extraction, transportation, and processing.
• Renewable - these are substances and forces created on Earth thanks to the current flow of solar energy: heat, atmospheric moisture, precipitation, and all fresh waters, hydroenergy, energy of winds, waves, and currents, as well as some minerals, and all living organisms of the ecosystem. Finally, humans themselves are the most important resource of the biosphere. All of them turn out to be practically exhaustible if the rate of their extraction exceeds the rate of renewal.
Regarding renewables, they are capable of reproduction at rates lagging behind consumption rates. These resources include soil, vegetation, wildlife, as well as some mineral resources, for example, salts that precipitate on the bottoms of lakes and marine lagoons. They can be reproduced through natural processes and maintained in a certain constant quantity, determined by the level of their annual reproduction and consumption.
Inexhaustible resources are predominantly external processes and phenomena relative to the Earth, such as solar energy and its derivatives, wind energy, energy of moving water, energy from the Earth's depths. Atmospheric air and water, etc., can be conditionally attributed to these resources. In quantitative terms, these elements of the environment are practically inexhaustible.
Recreational resources. Recreational resources are considered to be territories that serve as places for mass recreation of the population. In geography, they refer to activities often called tourism and recreation, which include various services for tourists and vacationers. Recreational resources can be natural (sections of the sea coast, riverbanks, lakes, forests, mountainous areas, etc.) and anthropogenic (for example, historical and architectural landmarks of cities). They are differentiated into resort, health, tourist, sports, and excursion resources.
Mineral resources. Mineral or fossil resources are natural formations of the Earth's crust of organic or inorganic origin, used in the field of material production.
Deposits of useful minerals form fields, including industrial ones, which represent economic interest due to their technical and economic indicators. By their physical properties, they are divided into solid, liquid, and gaseous. The most widespread classification of useful minerals is based on their use:
• Fuel and energy / oil, natural gas, coal, uranium ores, combustible shales, peat, etc.;
• Ore / ores of ferrous and non-ferrous, rare and precious metals;
• Chemical raw materials / phosphorites, apatites, potassium and other salts, sulfur, etc.;
• Natural building materials and non-ore useful minerals / limestones, ornamental, technical and precious stones, mineral waters, etc.
Reserves of useful minerals are determined as a result of geological surveys.
Biological resources. Biological resources refer to biological objects (species, populations, communities) included in human economic activity as labor objects and means of production.
Among biological resources, based on types of economic use, forest, pasture, hunting, fish resources, medicinal plant resources, etc., are distinguished. The territories where a particular resource is reproduced are called habitats. For example, natural forage lands are places where forage plants grow, while hunting grounds refer to the habitats of game fauna, etc.
Natural conditions. Natural resources cannot exist and be used outside of natural conditions, which are their natural-historical base.
Moreover, specific natural conditions are necessary for the emergence and development of resources. Elements of nature that influence human life and activity but do not participate in material production at this stage are called natural conditions. Therefore, nature acts for humans simultaneously as a resource and as a habitat.
Among the components of the natural environment, characteristics of natural conditions typically include relief, climate, geological environment, surface and underground waters, soils, and biota. The synthesis of a component-wise consideration of natural conditions is the assessment of landscapes as a whole.
Resource cycle. To obtain energy and create necessary products, humans find, extract, and transport the necessary natural resources for processing, involving them in the resource cycle. "The resource cycle is the totality of transformations and spatial movements of a certain substance or group of substances occurring at all stages of its use by humans" /E.A. Arustamova, 1999/.
Resource cycles differ by the type of the main substance or combination of substances involved, and each cycle usually develops a number of side and accompanying sub-cycles based on the diverse use of the main resource and additional primary materials involved in economic turnover.
The main resource cycles include cycles of energy resources and energy, metal ore resources and metals, non-metallic mineral raw materials, forest resources and timber, soil, climatic resources and agricultural raw materials, resources of fauna and flora (I.V. Komar, 1975).
Resource cycles function and develop in precise interrelation with each other, as the use of the same substance of nature usually occurs in conjunction with the use of other substances.
The Chui Valley possesses diverse land, water, and biological resources, which are covered in other sections.
The subsoil of the Chui Basin is rich in useful minerals. To date, many large and medium deposits of solid minerals have been explored and assessed. Particularly, the eastern part of the Chui Basin (the interfluve of Shamsy - Kyzyl-Suu - Konorchok).
The minerals found in the Proterozoic and Paleozoic rocks of the Kyrgyz Ridge are represented by polymetallic ore reserves. A number of deposits of noble non-ferrous metals have been explored and are ready for development, including the Mironovskoye bismuth deposit with recommendations for its industrial development. The deposit is located very close to the power transmission line and the water intake well on the Kara-Bulak River.
In addition to these deposits, there are others related to the discovery and development of non-ferrous metal deposits - lead and zinc, based on which the Aktuz and Bordu mining enterprises have started operating, now united in the Kyrgyz Mining and Metallurgical Combine.
Gold ore deposits have been identified and preliminarily studied: left-bank Taldy-Bulak, Kuranzhayloo, Chym-Bulak, Berkut, Kara-Moro, Dolpran, and others. Among them, the Taldy-Bulak and Kuranzhayloo deposits have been explored in the most detail.
The Taldy-Bulak gold ore deposit is located 35 km southwest of the district center of Kemin (Bystrovka). The deposit was discovered in 1963 and is represented by three ore reserves: main, northern, and upper. The gold reserves amount to 70-80 tons (A. Masaliev, Kyrgyz Ruh, from January 15-21, 1997). In 1994, a technical and economic justification for the industrial development of the left-bank Taldy-Bulak gold ore deposit was completed.
The Chui Valley is rich in deposits of non-ore building materials, which are found practically throughout the entire territory of the Chui Valley. The largest of them is the Kirtavylginskoye deposit of granites and diorites. The reserves suitable for industrial use are estimated at approximately 5 million m³. The industrial reserves of the quarry will last for more than 100 years.
According to specialists, granites and diorites meet all the requirements imposed on them and are excellent facing stones.
Very large reserves of limestones with industrial significance have been identified in Karagaylu-Bulak (near the limestone plant of Dzhiel-Aryk). The Dzhiel-Aryk limestone plant produces lime. However, the current volume of production does not meet the needs of the Chui Valley. The main reason for this situation is the lack of a raw material base for the plant. Therefore, the Karagaylu-Bulak limestone deposit can serve as a reliable raw material base for the Dzhiel-Aryk plant. The reserves of raw materials, calculated by specialists, amount to 21.1 million tons. Industrial limestone reserves are also found in the Kegetin Gorge.
Several deposits of clays and loams suitable in their natural form or with additives for the production of building bricks have been explored in the Chui Valley. Practically everywhere, there are inexhaustible reserves of clays and loams for brick production.
Large industrial reserves of clay deposits include Burana (13.8 million m³), Bash-Karasu - 4.3 million m³, Bultheke (Ak-Suu), Kainindinskoye, and others. Morphologically, the Burana loam deposit is a mantle-like deposit divided into two areas: Western, with an area of 0.88 km², and Eastern - with an area of 0.48 km². The thickness of the loams in the reserve calculation contour ranges from 4.3 to 20.0 m on the western section and from 14.3 to 20.0 m on the eastern. The loam reserves as raw materials amount to 14,320 thousand m³. The increase in reserves is possible due to the area adjacent to the eastern section from the east. The Kegetin deposit consists of limestone transformed into marble from the Proterozoic.
Sand and gravel materials for the production of concrete and crushed stone are exploited in the cities of Kemin, Tokmok, Bishkek, Belovodsk, Kara-Balta, and others.
There are small peat deposits in the area of the town of Ivanovka in Tokmok and some other places in the Chui Valley.
For food consumption and livestock needs, salt has been mined since ancient times. The extraction of the so-called Kara-Tuz salt (Zheldy-Suu) became widespread. Currently, this salt deposit is conserved.
The oil and gas resources of the Chui Valley have not yet been fully assessed due to the lack of deep drilling studies. Specialists consider the pre-Kyrgyz trough of the Eastern Chui Basin to be the most promising for discovering oil and gas deposits. Predictive studies by geologists show that there are sufficient signs in the trough for discovering industrial reserves of oil and gas. In this regard, it is necessary to create joint ventures with foreign companies capable of implementing this practical task.
Nature has generously endowed the valley with thermal and mineral springs. In terms of the wealth and diversity of hydrothermal sources, the Chui Valley occupies one of the leading places in the republic. On its territory, there are several points of manifestation of various mineral waters, both natural outflows and those uncovered by drilling wells.
Through numerous discharges, longitudinal and transverse in the Kyrgyz Ridge, deep waters emerge in the form of mineral-thermal springs, which are used for therapeutic purposes.
Currently, only one thermal water deposit is used in the Chui Valley - Issyk-Ata, based on which the resort of the same name operates. The temperature of the water emerging from the granites reaches 42-53 °C.
Another significant thermal deposit is the Alamudun, which emerges from cracks in the granites. Here, the total flow rate of the springs is 7 liters/second, with a temperature of 25-35 °C. The close proximity of the thermal waters to the capital (30 km to Bishkek) facilitates the organization of a resort and therapeutic institution here. There are also sources of Ak-Suu with a water temperature of 20-25 °C, Shabyr - 25-35 °C, Jeldy-Suu - 20-23 °C, and Kyzyl-Suu - 21-26 °C. The Kara-Balti thermal springs have a temperature of 24-25 °C, which are currently not in use.
Carbonated waters of the Narzan type from Ak-Suu are of practical interest; the deposit is located on the northern slope of the Kyrgyz Ridge and has long been known under the name of Dzhartash. Since 1970, their industrial bottling has been organized.
To ensure thermal water for sanitary and therapeutic institutions located in Bishkek, geologists have conducted exploratory work. For this purpose, 4 wells have been drilled in the city of Bishkek to a depth of 300-700 m. As a result, the Bishkek thermal deposit was discovered. The water temperature ranges from 33 °C to 39 °C. According to geologists' forecasts, the territory of Bishkek is promising for thermal waters. Therefore, exploration and clarification of geological reserves of mineral waters will continue.
Near the village of Kamyshanovka in the Chui Valley, there are deposits of balneological peat mud. The reserves of Kamyshanov mud amount to 161.5 thousand m³. They are used by many therapeutic institutions in the Chui Valley, including the Issyk-Ata resort.
The distribution of natural resources in the Chui Valley is characterized by significant unevenness, which serves as a natural basis for the development of territorial distribution of labor.
In our country, measures for the protection of nature and rational use of natural resources have been elevated to the rank of a fundamental law of society, as stated in the Constitution of the Kyrgyz Republic: "In the interests of present and future generations, necessary measures are taken in the republic for the protection and rational use of land and its subsoil, water resources, plant and animal life, as well as ensuring the reproduction of natural wealth and improving the environment."
Rational use of natural resources is the concern not only of the relevant state bodies and interested ministries but of the entire population. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen the propaganda of a rational approach to national wealth - nature, through the press, radio, and television. We need not only good laws for nature protection but also to cultivate a good attitude towards it ourselves.