Synthetic minerals represent an enormous variety of products that find end uses in abrasives, advanced ceramics, fibres, refractories, pigments and synthetic gems. A comparison between natural and synthetic minerals leads to the conclusion that synthetics are used for high quality and high-tech products, when very strict specifications of the raw materials are required, whereas when high tonnage of raw materials are needed, natural minerals are used instead due to their lower cost. The world market for technical ceramics, the most important field of synthetic minerals, varies significnatly depending on the materials considered, but in any case it hovers annually around the US$£10,000m to $15,000m level. Annual growth can be estimated between 2-8%. europe absorbs nearly 1% with Germany accounting for 50% of that.
