By 2010 it may become known as one of the world's top producers of a mineral few people know much about and even fewer can pronounce - molybdenum (mo-LIB-duh-num).

General Moly, a Lakewood, Colo.-based publicly traded mining company, is working to acquire the necessary land-use and environmental permits to develop an open-pit mine about 20 miles north of this central Nevada county seat.

If the company succeeds, it could turn this sleepy tourism-dependent town of 500 residents into a small boomtown with high-paying jobs that would give the county and the state a needed economic boost.

View from near the center of the pit planned for General Moly's Mount Hope Mine near Eureka. ULF BUCHHOLZ / RESEARCH DIRECTOR

Although Eureka wouldn't become the place it was in its late-1870s heyday when the population climbed to around 10,000, its quality of life would improve with the addition of company-built housing and improvements to the infrastructure and the local school district footed by General Moly.

If General Moly's projections are accurate, it will be in line to become one of the world's foremost producers of molybdenum, supplying an estimated 8 percent of the mineral used as an agent to harden construction steel and develop stainless steel materials used in oil exploration and pipelines and in the refining of crude oil.

Within 16 months, General Moly should begin mining and processing molybdenum - known in the industry simply as "moly" - at Mount Hope, a nearly 9,000-foot, pine-covered peak that overlooks the historic Pony Express route.

The company will hire 500 to 600 workers to build and develop the mine and 390 when the mine opens to dig and process ore.

The mine is expected to have a 44-year life, one of the longest in Nevada mining history.

And, as General Moly develops Mount Hope, it is in the preliminary stages of the applying for permits for a second moly mine site, named the Liberty project, east of Tonopah.

"Nevada mining is synonymous with gold and this being a world-class moly deposit is a different dimension," said Patrick Rogers, director of environmental and permitting for General Moly's Elko office. "Nobody knows much about it because moly is sort of new to the Nevada mining industry."

Patrick Rogers, director of environmental and permitting for General Moly, talks about the company's planned mines at its Elko office. ULF BUCHHOLZ / RESEARCH DIRECTOR

Incorporated in 1925 as General Mines Corp., General Moly went through a series of name changes - Idaho General Petroleum and Mines Corp. in 1966, Idaho General Mines Inc. in 1967 and General Moly, to reflect the company's new emphasis in mining molybdenum, in 2007.

Part of the Mount Hope site is controlled by the Bureau of Land Management and part was held by oil giant Exxon. General Moly's executives decided to take a close look at Mount Hope's prospects and liked what they saw.

With the prospect of the oil industry expanding and the price of molybdenum rising, General Moly acquired Exxon's piece in 2004, and the company went to work drafting the required environmental reports, getting the necessary government permits, preparing the site and building processing plants to operate an open-pit mine.

The company's site assessment indicated Mount Hope could produce 1.3 billion pounds of molybdenum over 44 years, including 32 years of mining operations and 12 years of low-grade production.

One of the unusual characteristics of the site is that most of the high-grade ore is toward the surface and will be relatively easy to get to. It also assures a top-dollar product soon after the mine opens.

The site has a present net value of $1.4 billion and based on conservative estimates, the company's investment would be recovered in two years.

To minimize risk and engage a long-term customer, General Moly in February signed a joint venture agreement with POS-Minerals Corp., a subsidiary of Korean steel giant POSCO, the world's third largest steel producer. The deal gives POSCO a 20 percent investment in the company and provides General Moly a source of cash with the Korean company already paying $100 million with another $70 million due when the permits are secured.

General Moly also signed a purchase agreement with the world's leading steel producer, ArcelorMittal S.A., a global company based in Luxembourg, which will generate another $70 million for the company.

Last month, it also signed an agreement with Sojitz Corp., a Japanese trading company, offering exclusive rights to distribute molybdenum oxide in that country and nonexclusive rights to sell it in South Korea. The deal involves the sale of 1 million pounds a year at market prices.

It will take another year and a half for General Moly to get all its necessary permits. The company expects the mine will operating by the fourth quarter of 2010.

The company won't be able to hire personnel for several months, which is one of the reasons why the project has maintained a relatively low profile in Nevada.

But once hiring begins, it will be seeking a number of high-tech workers - engineers, geologists and metallurgists - in addition to rank-and-file workers who will operate the heavy machinery.

Today's mining industry uses satellite imagery, computer modeling and data management before digging.

Rogers said the annual salary is projected to be about $68,000 a year, although the Nevada Mining Association said the average mining salary in the state is a little higher, in the low $70,000s.

But it's the big equipment that draws most of the attention in mining. In fact, many examples of the massive haul trucks, scrapers, shovels and digging equipment will be on display Sept. 22-24 at the Las Vegas Convention Center for the quadrennial National Mining Association MINExpo.

Open-pit mining is a massive undertaking.

In pit mining, it's a drill and blast, truck and shuttle operation. General Moly expects to dig 60,000 tons of rock a day that would be crushed, ground and reduced to rock size.

Holes are drilled and filled with explosives. After the charges are detonated, the boulders are broken into smaller sizes and loaded on 240-ton capacity haul trucks. An on-site assay lab determines if there's enough molybdenum to be economically processed. The moly-filled boulders are processed; the rest go to a waste pile.

The boulders that are saved are crushed, ground and reduced to slurry that are placed in tanks. A flotation reagent - pine oil - is added and air is injected. Because of the action of the reagent, the molybdenite adheres to the surface of the bubbles produced. The top of the tank becomes a froth, which is decanted, dried, filtered, leeched and roasted to become the finished product, ready for shipment.

Because the mine is just a mile from a state highway, it will be relatively easy for the company to ship the product. In addition, a major east-west railroad line is about 40 miles away.

But because a vast portion of the area surrounding Mount Hope has agricultural uses, the company is spending thousands of dollars to collect data and model potential effects on neighboring farmers and ranchers.

Most of the water would be drawn from the Diamond Valley, and the company's models show minimal effect on water over the 44-year life of the mine.

The state engineer will monitor the company's water use, just as the office will review the Southern Nevada Water Authority's acquisition of water from Lincoln County.

The company already has an active reclamation plan in place to restore the land to provide vegetation for a habitat for the existing wildlife and cattle grazing. It also will put $50 million in a fund to assure that the reclamation plan is carried out.

Possibly the biggest concern involves the socio-economic changes that would occur in Eureka with the presence of the mine.

Jim Evans, Eureka County's planner and development coordinator and a lifelong resident, said there's no firm grasp on how the town will change with the influx of General Moly workers.

"I think the majority of people who live here would rather not see any significant population increase," Evans said. "We're certainly not in a position to sustain a lot of growth, and we've developed a fairly comprehensive planning initiative to deal with it."

The biggest concern, Evans said, is planning for and implementing growth initiatives and then not seeing the growth come to fruition.

"Our community is very conservative when it comes these issues," Evans said. "We've sustained and associated with boom-and-bust cycles and as a result of our conservative awareness, our community is somewhat hesitant to accept or reject this planning initiative."

Rogers said in the early going, the company expects workers will commute to the mine and the company will provide buses to shuttle employees.

But the company knows that if its project is as strong as executives expect it to be, socio-economic issues will emerge.

Last month, General Moly broke ground on about 200 units of temporary housing about two miles from Eureka High School.

"We don't know how many workers will commute, but we have housing started, and we'll have it ready for expansion if it's needed," Rogers said.

The company also has been in discussions with the Eureka School District, the sheriff and other government leaders to assure residents the company cares about the community.

The company also has spread some goodwill to bolster its image. Last month, it installed stadium lights for the high school's football field to allow the Eureka High Vandals to have night games.

"County officials are asking all the right questions," Rogers said. "They asked all the questions I would ask if I lived in Eureka, on impact to the schools, impact to the sheriff's department. We've talked with the sheriff and the school officials. We understand their needs. It's all about open communication and understanding what their concerns are."

And Eureka is only the beginning for General Moly.

If Mount Hope is on the front burner at full boil, the Liberty project is on the back burner in a slow simmer.

Liberty will have a 33-year mine life with 24 years of mining and nine years of processing. The deposits are smaller, but they're of similar grade to the Mount Hope moly.

The site has produced copper - a mineral often found in the environs of molybdenum - in the past. But the company hasn't determined whether it would also mine for copper.

"After all," Rogers said, "we are General Moly."