[pigleg]

I've heard the same theory would apply to depletion of any non-renewable resource. Does anyone know of any analysis on that?

Found a couple of mentions:
one
two

I don't think any of the metals are as essential as oil, so 'peak silver' isn't really as scary, but still interesting and maybe peaks have already occurred?

Traditional economists are waiting for the next recession and expecting the commodities to fall, but the ones at peak presumably would surprise and go higher despite the slowdown?

[SoothSayer]

Peak Helium ....

Helium is used in body scanners etc ... and is becoming more scarce.

[DoctorDoom]

Peaks in most other resources could be ameliorated with enough energy. For instance, you can get helium out of the air - if you have enough energy to extract it. A lot of materials, especially metals, can be recycled (again, with expenditure of energy). Even things like water could be obtained if you have the energy to produce it.

[pigleg]

It would be great to have more examples of the peak theory in action, it might add even more weight to PO.

Also, we could see what happened, did the price go to the moon? Did technology save the day? Will demand fall off?

Hey yes, looks like it was 1997 for world helium:

Found -
Helium Supply/Demand

Helium use

Looks like certain helium applications have fallen off drastically. The price hasn't shot up so much, but there're still stockpiles?

[UIUCstudent01]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('DoctorDoom', 'P')eaks in most other resources could be ameliorated with enough energy. For instance, you can get helium out of the air - if you have enough energy to extract it. A lot of materials, especially metals, can be recycled (again, with expenditure of energy). Even things like water could be obtained if you have the energy to produce it.

[pigleg]

Hey, here's a new one: Peak oil and peak gold

[WebHubbleTelescope]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('DoctorDoom', 'P')eaks in most other resources could be ameliorated with enough energy. For instance, you can get helium out of the air - if you have enough energy to extract it. A lot of materials, especially metals, can be recycled (again, with expenditure of energy). Even things like water could be obtained if you have the energy to produce it.

[UIUCstudent01]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pigleg', 'H')ey, here's a new one: Peak oil and peak gold

[EnergySpin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WebHubbleTelescope', '
')
You can't get it out of air, unless you go to the top of the troposphere.
l

[WebHubbleTelescope]

I don't know how we can in general run out of elemental materials as you describe. I do understand how we can run out of animal species through the gradual process known as extinction.

The element helium is a very special case. Since it is inert, it doesn't combine with anything else. And since it is lighter than everything but hydrogen it does escape into space as we use it up. No such thing as recycling helium as we can do with just about every other material.

You have to go through lots of air to pick out those helium molecules hanging around through diffusion as they make their journey up through the atmosphere.

I think it is rather important to consider this because of helium's important role in research and medicine.

[EnergySpin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WebHubbleTelescope', '
')I think it is rather important to consider this because of helium's important role in research and medicine.

[WebHubbleTelescope]

My experience has been with helium canisters and liquid nitrogen cylinders. Helium can leak through just about anything and I would always be careful to tighten those valves hard.
On the other hand, liquid nitrogen has to keep releasing through a pressure relief valve to keep the thing from exploding. Many a time we had LN2 cylinders stored for just a few days that go completely empty. I got pretty good at estimating full cylinders by rocking each one back and forth to pick the full one.

I mention liquid nitrogen because liquid natural gas probably has a lot of the same properties and I kind of believe we will waste tremendous amounts of the stuff via leakage. I thought that actually prevents us from transporting it too far a distance.

[skeptic]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WebHubbleTelescope', '
')I mention liquid nitrogen because liquid natural gas probably has a lot of the same properties and I kind of believe we will waste tremendous amounts of the stuff via leakage. I thought that actually prevents us from transporting it too far a distance.

[WebHubbleTelescope]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('skeptic', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WebHubbleTelescope', '
')I mention liquid nitrogen because liquid natural gas probably has a lot of the same properties and I kind of believe we will waste tremendous amounts of the stuff via leakage. I thought that actually prevents us from transporting it too far a distance.

[emailking]

It's not being wasted is the point. It's being used to power the ship and keep the liquified gas cold. That energy has to come from somehwere.

[ekaggata]

Referring to the idea in the first post (and the two links therein), the idea of a Hubbert's peak in a metal seems to be off the mark to me.

When we refer to a Hubbert's peak in oil, for example, we are not talking about running out of the material, but running out of the energy which is "contained" within it (in this case, chemical energy).

We could of course, with advanced technology, reconstitute crude oil exactly as it was from its original hydrocarbon constituents - but at great energetic cost. This negates the only reason we ever wanted it, i.e. for its energy content. In that sense, the original resource has genuinely been eliminated.

So if we think about something like silver or copper, at what point have we "used it up"? If it forms oxides, it can always be separated again from the oxygen; again at energetic cost, but this is a bit like "re-mining" it.

Thus if our use of precious and base metals is either as a store of value, or as a constituent in an industrial process/product, and not as a source of energy, I don't see any sense in which there is ever a "destruction" of the resource, just potential for great changes in its price due to the energy cost of isolating it. Uranium is another fish of kettles, of course.

IOW, Hubbert's analysis doesn't apply to metals (ignoring nuclear reactions). So I guess I'm saying Hubbert's concept is deeply tied to the second law of thermodynamics.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ekaggata', '
')Thus if our use of precious and base metals is either as a store of value, or as a constituent in an industrial process/product, and not as a source of energy, I don't see any sense in which there is ever a "destruction" of the resource, just potential for great changes in its price due to the energy cost of isolating it.

[ekaggata]

Yes, Doly, I agree in practice the two could look pretty similar under certain conditions, in the early part of the process .. e.g. if the metal is relatively cheap to mine, and its uses involve it being locked in permanently to something which made it very difficult to re-extract. Then you could have a situation where the overall production would have to go into decline and not be able to meet demand. But ultimately that decline is not completely permanent in the same way as with an energy resource.

I was just thinking that things like gold and copper can always be melted down or extracted from salts through electroplating etc. .. they won't be "lost to the world" even if the mines stop producing.

(and they won't leak into space like helium )

What is useful to the world about crude oil, its huge stored solar energy, is lost permanently on first use.

[WebHubbleTelescope]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emailking', 'I')t's not being wasted is the point. It's being used to power the ship and keep the liquified gas cold. That energy has to come from somehwere.