“Mineral element consumption/extraction is rising at a rate of around 3% a year, and that will continue up to 2050,” Josep Peñuelas, the other co-author of the study, said. “In that scenario, it is possible that we will have used up all our reserves of some of those elements (gold and antimony) by 2050, and of others (molybdenum and zinc) within a hundred years.”
Because anyone who worries or thinks about mineral availability in terms of reserves is an idiot sodding twat. Of course.
Yes Tim. I was indeed a trifle surprised when I read that 50% of Oz’s uranium was now produced by underground leaching of the ore.
By 2050? Gold? Not a chance.
And not because if gold does bocome harder to get by, the currently known marginal sites and/ or recycling from less than ideal sources becomes economically viable as the price rises.
That’s …well… boring.. and logical…
No.. Within the Rap/Gangsta scene alone there’s enough gold in that bling of theirs to tide the world over for a couple of decennia.
Get gold and kill off that godawful noise for good. What’s not to like?
Reminds me of some ’80s gangsa spoof movie where one character died by geing crushed to death by his gold bling.
googles… Ah! I’m Gonna Git You Sucka.
@Boganboy
As it was explained to me when I was there, Roxby Downs mines the uranium ore conventionally, but processes the ore underground, partly to avoid extensive surface workings, but mostly to contain the (still radioactive) waste in the hole it came from.
The leaching is just normal ore processing: they aren’t doing this by some sort of drilling/injection!
If I understand Tim correctly, he means that at higher prices, resources turn into reserves.
Technology advances help as well. A lot of gold ore deposits were uneconomical to mine until heap leaching came along. Some of those ore deposits were the tailings from older mines.
Similar story with fracking.
Thanks for the info, TtC.
Now this one really takes the cake:
Humans Plunder the Periodic Table
“Humanity frees itself from limitation of elements solely available from biological sources”
do people actually “use” elements? In the practical sense of turning them into something else? Surely not!