What’s the Difference Between a Precious and Non-Precious Opal?
The word opal notoriously conjures images of rainbows and colorful flashes. But not all opal aligns with this visual; it speaks to precious opal, but largely neglects non-precious opal which accounts for a great deal of the opal recovered from mining.
Opal is formed from a solution of silicon dioxide and water. As rainwater trickles down through the fissures in the earth it picks up silica from sandstone along the way. Next, the now silica-rich solution settles into cracks
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