Answer should be E.
A conjunction such as "because" usually opens a new clause, and should be followed by a subject and verb:
I like Jane because she is smart.

however, the addition of a preposition ("of" or "to") changes this rule: 'Because of' or 'owing to' should be followed not by a clause, but rather by a thing or list of things (nouns): ..."because of A", or "because of A, B, and C".
e.g. "I like cinemas because of the air conditioning and comfy seats."
'owing to' in C is indeed followed by a list of things (erosion, movement and volcanic activity), but is then followed by "putting gold literally", where it is not clear who is the subject - who/what "put" gold in the hands of anyone with a shovel.

E solves this problem by taking the preposition out, so the conjunction "since" signals the beginning of a separate clause and rearranges the sentence so that the clause has a subject and a verb:
The plural subject of the clause is the list if A, B and C (erosion, movement and activity), and the verb is "put" - A, B, and C put gold in the hands of anyone with a shovel.

Geva Stern wrote:Answer should be E.
A conjunction such as "because" usually opens a new clause, and should be followed by a subject and verb:
I like Jane because she is smart.

however, the addition of a preposition ("of" or "to") changes this rule: 'Because of' or 'owing to' should be followed not by a clause, but rather by a thing or list of things (nouns): ..."because of A", or "because of A, B, and C".
e.g. "I like cinemas because of the air conditioning and comfy seats."
'owing to' in C is indeed followed by a list of things (erosion, movement and volcanic activity), but is then followed by "putting gold literally", where it is not clear who is the subject - who/what "put" gold in the hands of anyone with a shovel.

E solves this problem by taking the preposition out, so the conjunction "since" signals the beginning of a separate clause and rearranges the sentence so that the clause has a subject and a verb:
The plural subject of the clause is the list if A, B and C (erosion, movement and activity), and the verb is "put" - A, B, and C put gold in the hands of anyone with a shovel.

Hi Geva

Thanks for yr explanation...

can u plz elaborate bit more on WHY A option IS Wrong ... ?

Thanks!

As my previous post explains, "because of" should be followed by a noun or noun phrase. So the list following because of acts as that noun phrase, but note that A still has the verb "put" after the list of A, B and C - it is still not clear what is the subject of that verb (i.e. who/what put gold in the hands).

A simpler example which commits the same error as A:

I liked winter because of the rain made everything wet.

I hope you can see the problem here: the rain is the part of the main clause, and cannot act as the separate subject of the verb "made" - so we're not sure who/what "made everything wet".

E corrects thus by removing the preposition 'of', allowing the conjunction "because" to open a new clause with its own subject and verb:

I liked winter because the rain made everything wet.

IMO E