[SustainableTompkins] peak metals?

[George Adams]

re Thomas Shelley on the Subject: No shortage of metals in the future?


> I have a deep suspicion that there is something wrong with ...Canadian
> metals guru Brian Smith..[who].. says over the long term there shouldn't be
> any metals shortages....




Yes, I too question that sanguine prediction...and much better research
speaks forcefully against those optimistic conclusions.
A year ago, researchers from Yale U and other places tried to get a better
estimate of how much mineable copper remained in the earth's crust, how much
lay buried in landfills and how much could be gained by care in recycling
what is now in use.  What they concluded was basically that only if the
developing world foregos living the electrified life of western
industrialized nations will there be enough copper to go around.  PNAS
papers are heavily reviewed for publication.

here is a link to a discussion of the paper with its abstract appended.
http://www.mindfully.org/Sustainability/2006/Metals-Global-Demand27jan06.htm

If those numbers are even in the ball park, then either we all learn to live
on less metals or we acknowledge that there is an elephant of overpopulation
standing right in the middle of our debates and being steadfastly ignored by
almost everyone.

[Note, I am not volunteering to euthanize myself...population is the
thorniest topic ever and only extraordinary misery will put it before the
public if extraordinary courage cannot.  There is no lack of foresight.
After all Paul Ehrlich founded ZPG in 1968.  And there was that Malthus
fella.  Not if, just when]

-George
-- 
freedom is not more important than fairness and much easier to fake.