I don’t think that the growth rate will be steady state upwards.
Some metals will be short in supply, some minerals (phosphor) too.

With metals: there is a relation:
a.: rising resources % / rising price %
I know this for Uranium, having a factor of 300 more in availability if prices rise by a factor of 10.
Source: SciAm.
So there will not be a longterm shortage, price will simply rise and new “mines” opened.
Price of natural Uranium is nearly not influencing price of electricity frum Nuclear Power Plants.
But this is totally different for any of the other metals maybe except Calcium and Magnesium.

Indium has replaced lead in solders, is needed in PV solar cells and in many displays.
Indium is mostly a byproduct from Zinc refining.
So where to get if demand exceeds supply and at which cost if demand doubles?

I have no idea if these data are existing for any of the other metals that may be continuously or momentarily not available sufficiently.

Search for a replacement is easy for copper: aluminum has 60% roughly of the electrical conductivity of copper. Power grid lines are made from aluminum alloys since many decades, so small motors, transformers and housewiring may follow soon.

Replacement for steel is limited to the use of concrete – reinforced or not, but much less steeel used . Only minor amounts are replaceable by aluminum or plastics.
But a partial replacement will help a lot in smoothing out heavy price oscillations.

I do not see a replacement for the steel-alloying elements, so Cr, Ni, Mo, Co will be in short if demand is rising further. With Ni there are 2 big producing localities: Sudbury and Norilsk (both from geologically old meteoritic impacts), so there will be limited supply in the future and stainless steel will be recycled better than now and may be restricted in use by rising prize. Co is especially critical as Kongo is a major mining site (in the last Cobalt-crisis Kongo had 90% of the world mining capacity for Co.) If failing politically prizes may be skyrocketing. And so SmCo-magnets, basis of heavy duty motors that are allowed to run hotter than with FeNdB-magnets.

Platinum will be of special interest because its use as catalyst in cars exhaust cleaning is wasting near 30% of the typically 2 grams that are used. Some Palladium therein too same situation.
Unless other catalysts are found we will either have to develop motors that are “clean” so don’t need a catalysing afterburner (no way to be seen today) or we will have to abandone using Pt in these wasting application and accept once more a lot of unburnt Hydrocarbons in the exhaust. To reach this limit the price has to rise above 300$/g (my estimate, not biased on any information).

Rare earths: we will have to introduce a recycling scheme for energy saving lamps and computer screens.
How much of the price of a typical ? screen or incandescent lamp or HQI-lamp is from rare earths?

So all this will limit continuous growth, not only in China, dwindling supply will limit any producer of equipment.
China will have a nearer difficulty: where to spend the many $$ accumulated? This pile is growing faster than they can spend the $$.
And a very near one: the real-estate bubble to burst within one or 2 years. (My own estimate, by feeling only).

So other dear readers, please share your information on these topics.

Merry Christmas to everybody and a Happy New Year 2011
and don’t forget
“che sera sera, whatever will be will be…”
RH

A few issues:

Although good data is hard to come by, for the US, at least, there was no relationship between change in primary metal demand and change in GDP from 1930-2006; with an r^2 of 0.214. Big graph here:(tinyurl.com/34t3jvz); data from USGS (pubs.usgs.gov/fs/2009/3008/) and Bureau of Economic Analysis (tinyurl.com/35b35xg). The data for American metal consumption is quite erratic from year to year, despite more or less constant GDP growth (although this is for GMP(1+2)).

Not differentiating between the different GMP(2) elements loses some key detail. For example, some elements are tied together e.g. aluminium+gallium, zinc+indium. A potential growth area for both gallium and indium is in CIGS thin film solar. CIGS remains dependent on government subsidies. There are other ways to harness the sun without these elements.

There are abundant reserves and resources of bauxite – I wouldn’t include aluminium, which is very recyclable, in GMP(2).

90% of chromium ends up in stainless steel, which is also easily recycled. According to the USGS, the world has sufficient chromium to “meet conceivable demand for centuries”.

The key issues as to whether lack of metals will retard economic growth comes down to substitutability and increased efficiency. With dysprosium the main growth area is electric motors, which if needs be can revert to ferrite or AC motors. Additionally Japan now recycles and has found ways to apply it more effectively to increase intrinsic coercivity.

Which is not to say there aren’t places where element shortages will require changes – for example the best CFLs and LEDs require terbium and europium, which is going to be an issue. As may tellurium for CdTe solar cells. However I wouldn’t say it’s a major economic dislocation. I’d be interested if you could identify where you think serious long-term economic damage would be done.

“If there is no major increase in GMP(1) with the concomitant increase in GMP(2), then neither India nor any other large nation will be able to grow its GDP as China has done.”

I am hoping Jack or others will point out any omissions that have some factor of potential world shortage.

is this not the road upon which china has embarked? as their need arise?

Thank you very much for a very well-written, very well-reasoned, very well-argued… (and long overdue) article.

For a very long time I have been an optimist “at the micro level” and a pessimist at the macro level. (the micro-level, defined also as my own personal life and situation …..which is something I can more or less do something about, shape, affect, influence and etc.)

Whereas the macro level is a collective responsibility and I have little hope that humanity will be able to “step up to the plate” …and do so in time.

But if you take the perspective of a Martian (or maybe even of an extragalactic creature who can see us from extremely far away by seeing “much faster” than the speed of light (a second violation of the laws of nature since you have already mentioned one) the survival of the human race is probably not one of his major concerns.

I personally doubt that our “values”, institutions, political systems, economic systems, social systems, cultural systems…and their related policies and etc. etc. will be able to respond in time to avoid catastrophe.

But it is also unlikely that every single human will die. Those who are left over hopefully will think of some better system(s) for humanity to live with or under….(other than about 200 nation states, all speaking different languages and having different “beliefs” and etc. etc.)

Basic arithmetic (which is out of fashion these days) would probably indicate that we can either have 1 billion people on the planet each consuming 100 units of GDP (and resources “and etc. etc”. ) (i.e. and polluting, contaminating and destroying) or we can have 10 billion consuming only 10 units. (or 100 billion consuming 1 unit each)

But to do the second or third options and thereby achieve the ever more illusive and elusive “sustainability” everyone would need to be willing (and able) to do with a lot less.

You have started to “do the math” and nature will take care of the rest.

All the best and regards (and again thanks)

Max

congratulation; you hit the nail. I am convinced that only a small number of analysts have thought about the consequences you have told about in this article. The problem for them is, that they only see (they have no time to investigate deeply enough) only the big numbers, not the details.

You surely know, that the EU commission has published a report concerning the 14 metals and minerals, where a supply interruption or a diminuished sypply can bring the European industry to struggle. The minerals and metals reported in this analysis are nearly identical with that, another comment has named before me. What nobody has mentioned, is the same development of graphite as the REE´s at the beginning of this century. Former price declines, concentration onto China, new technologies with need for graphite, no exploration efforts in the west…
Best regareds

Dr. Dietmar Siebholz

From my recent research I would add lithium, berryllium, magnesium, vanadium, hafnium and tellurium to the list. There is also a mad scramble to tie up the best and biggest deposits of uranium and potash.

The amount of money flowing around the world trying to get a hold on economically strategic resources is astounding. I have had two mining investments bought out in the last month and several others have had significant percentages bought by larger companies or various types of financial entities.