Measure of Metal Supply Finds Future Shortage

Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.
Two Questions come to mind:
1. What other metals/materials that we have in abundance that we can
sub for them?
2 If above is not possible, what Off world sources are there?
AFAIK the Moon is Copper poor, Dennis Wingo of "Moon Rush" thinks there
may be asteroid deposited platinum on the Moon, Also
(metalic)asteroids are suspected/known? to contain platinum, what about
copper and zinc?

Just my $0.02

Space Cadet

derwetzelsDASHspacecadetATyahooDOTcom


Moon Society - St. Louis Chapter

http://www.moonsociety.org/chapters/stlouis/

The Moon Society is a non-profit educational and
scientific foundation formed to further scientific
study and development of the moon.

In message .com,
Space Cadet writes
Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.
Two Questions come to mind:
1. What other metals/materials that we have in abundance that we can
sub for them?

Silver can be substituted for copper in many applications. But I am
reminded that not so long ago there was a prediction that silver would
be the first element we ran out of.



--
Bernard Peek
London, UK. DBA, Manager, Trainer & Author.

In rec.arts.sf.science,sci.space.policy, On 19 Jan 2006 04:24:29
-0800, "Space Cadet" wrote:

Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.
Two Questions come to mind:
1. What other metals/materials that we have in abundance that we can
sub for them?
2 If above is not possible, what Off world sources are there?
AFAIK the Moon is Copper poor, Dennis Wingo of "Moon Rush" thinks there
may be asteroid deposited platinum on the Moon, Also
(metalic)asteroids are suspected/known? to contain platinum, what about
copper and zinc?

This was a story on Slashdot yesterday with hundreds of responses,
some even thoughtful and interesting.

OKay, you twisted my arm, here's the link:

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article...4&threshold=-1


Just my $0.02

Space Cadet

derwetzelsDASHspacecadetATyahooDOTcom


Moon Society - St. Louis Chapter

http://www.moonsociety.org/chapters/stlouis/

The Moon Society is a non-profit educational and
scientific foundation formed to further scientific
study and development of the moon.

On Thu, 19 Jan 2006 14:07:36 +0000, Bernard Peek wrote,
in part:

Silver can be substituted for copper in many applications. But I am
reminded that not so long ago there was a prediction that silver would
be the first element we ran out of.

That was before digital cameras.

John Savard
http://www.quadibloc.com/index.html
_________________________________________
Usenet Zone Free Binaries Usenet Server
More than 140,000 groups
Unlimited download
http://www.usenetzone.com to open account

I read that article. It makes several assumptions which, taking into
account past events, have a good probability of not occuring. Some of
these assumptions are that technology will remain at current levels and
that developing countries will develop along the same lines as
currently developed countries.

Ben Bradley,
If I might suggest for the ten thousandth time, as to doing exactly
what ETs have been doing for decades if not centuries; mining (aka
geological plundering and pillaging) the holy crapolla by way of so
easily extracting such nifty elements out of Venus. At least Venus is
by far the easiest other planet to get to/from and, it's by far the
easiest to safely land upon as well as for eventually exiting (each 19
month cycle of crew change) along with whatever inventory of extracted
goodies, of which there's no required importing of extremely complex
and spendy sorts of energy from Earth that need be the case. If
anything, spare/surplus energy can actually become a good part of what
Venus can provide on behalf of Earth.

Even going for the absolute wealth of normal and a perhaps few weird
minerals, plus reactive elements (including He3 that are upon and
within our extremely nearby salty moon can become doable, at least once
we've established the taboo/nondisclosure LSE-CM/ISS depot that's
tethered directly to the moon.

If you're not another stuck in the mainstream box sort of naysay guy or
gal, whereas such I actually have a few dozen viable and perfectly
doable notions for tapping into each of these nearest of orbs. Each of
my notions falls entirely within existing rocket-science, as well as
per using the regular laws of physics, thus I offer what's 100%
explainable and thereby achievable. It's all provable and otherwise
totally reliable as per anything Einstein ever managed to deliver.

The really big question is; Are you a team player, or a naysayer?
-

Life upon Venus, a township w/Bridge & ET/UFO Park-n-Ride Tarmac:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-town.htm
The Russian/China LSE-CM/ISS (Lunar Space Elevator)
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/lunar-space-elevator.htm
Venus ETs, plus the updated sub-topics; Brad Guth / GASA-IEIS
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-topics.htm

Space Cadet wrote:
Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.
Two Questions come to mind:
1. What other metals/materials that we have in abundance that we can
sub for them?
2 If above is not possible, what Off world sources are there?
AFAIK the Moon is Copper poor, Dennis Wingo of "Moon Rush" thinks there
may be asteroid deposited platinum on the Moon, Also
(metalic)asteroids are suspected/known? to contain platinum, what about
copper and zinc?

Just my $0.02

Space Cadet

derwetzelsDASHspacecadetATyahooDOTcom


Moon Society - St. Louis Chapter

http://www.moonsociety.org/chapters/stlouis/

The Moon Society is a non-profit educational and
scientific foundation formed to further scientific
study and development of the moon.

Being one myself, I have quite some faith in what most scientists say.
However, in this case, I would defer to the Chicago commodity markets.

cheers

oz

On 19 Jan 2006 04:24:29 -0800, Space Cadet wrote:

Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.

If we take copper, for example, 13 million tons are mined per year and
the Earth's crust is 50 parts per million of copper on the average.
If I did the arithmetic right, the top centimeter of the Earth's crust
contains a year's supply.

We probably won't have to use ordinary rock because landfills make
better mines.

--
http://hertzlinger.blogspot.com

Joseph Hertzlinger wrote:
On 19 Jan 2006 04:24:29 -0800, Space Cadet wrote:


Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.


If we take copper, for example, 13 million tons are mined per year and
the Earth's crust is 50 parts per million of copper on the average.
If I did the arithmetic right, the top centimeter of the Earth's crust
contains a year's supply.

We probably won't have to use ordinary rock because landfills make
better mines.

Too low grade an ore due to vast quantities of plastic bags etc. :-(
OTOH if we are already mining the landfills to recover petrochemicals
might as well go for the metals one way or another.

I think however that we will be deep sea mining nodules (not just
manganese down there) and maybe also extracting metals we want
electrolytically.

All is not lost however as if you've got nodule mining going anyway, it
does offer a low cost delivery system for bulk metals from orbit. Just
coat a few kilos of metal slug with a refacrory ablative layer made
from the waste slag and deorbit it with an EM gun so it splashes down on
top of your ocean floor mining concession. Repeat a million times a day
.. . .

--
Ian Malcolm. London, ENGLAND. (NEWSGROUP REPLY PREFERRED)
ianm[at]the[dash]malcolms[dot]freeserve[dot]co[dot]uk [at]=@, [dash]=- &
[dot]=.
*Warning* SPAM TRAP set in header, Use email address in sig. if you must.

"Space Cadet" wrote in message
oups.com...

Hi All found this article on Sci-Am:

http://tinyurl.com/ds6k8

Basically it says that the current supply of copper, platinum and zinc
is in short supply.


What it is, sadly, is pure economic illiteracy. No, we aren't going to run
out. Ever. The market won't let it happen. The scarcer it gets, the more
expensive it gets, the better substitutes become, until the substitutes are
superior and extraction stops. It doesn't run out, it just becomes
uncompetitive.

It is especially ridiculous to claim we'll 'run out' of metals, since they
can be recycled infinitely many times.