At its height the mine produced around 2 million carats of diamonds a year. However, from the 1970s onward, the Mir mine started producing smaller amounts of diamonds until in 2004 the mine was closed.
In 2010 plans came out of a Russian construction company hoping to build a domed city in the abandoned mine powered by solar energy. It could house up to 100,000 people.
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Image: Filip Singer
Sobolev & Logvinova et al. 2004. Mineral inclusions in microdiamonds and macrodiamonds from kimberlites of Yakutia: a comparative study