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Formula: NaCa2Mg3(PO4)3(CO3)(H2O)6
Compound phosphate
Specific gravity: 2.46 measured, 2.529 calculated
Hardness: 3½
Streak: White
Colour: Creamy white, colourless
Luminescence: Not fluorescent under UV
Solubility: Readily soluble in cold 10% hydrochloric acid
Environments
Carbonatites
Hydrothermal environments
Localities
At the type locality, the Kovdor Zheleznyi mine, Kovdor Massif, Murmansk Oblast, Russia, girvasite forms
creamy white spherulites to 1.5 mm in diameter, and rarely colourless and transparent single prismatic crystals up to
1 mm long and 0.07 mm across. It occurs in solution cavities in dolomite
carbonatite intimately intergrown with
bobierrite; minor pyrite is also
present, and dolomite lines the cavities. Girvasite is a
low-temperature, hydrothermal mineral formed from phosphatic solutions at 100 to 250oC
(AM 77.207).
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