[MrBill]

This is my greatest worry. The economic costs to replace infrastructure stolen by thieves in response to high prices and/or scarcity related to post peak oil resource depletion.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he 600-kilogram figures (1,320 pounds) were snatched by thieves this month, and found five days later in a scrap yard in the suburb of Bonteheuwel. Police said they were sold for less than 10,000 rand ($1,247), or 3 percent of their original cost.

Record copper and steel prices are fueling a South African crime wave that's targeted monuments, rail tracks, street lights and cables. With 3,000 unlicensed scrap-metal dealers in Cape Town alone, politicians plan to regulate the industry while companies turn to advertising to dissuade robbers.

Telkom South Africa Ltd. reported losses of $108 million from stolen copper cables in the 10 months through January. Telkom began a television campaign this month showing thieves yanking cables from telephones used by nurses and teachers.

Cable theft almost doubled in the 12 months through March 2007 and the impact, including lost output, on Africa's biggest economy may be 10 times the 228 million-rand cost of replacing the wiring, said Lorenda Nel, project manager at Johannesburg-based Business Against Crime.

[wisconsin_cur]

I agree Mr. Bill and it is the source of most of my pessimism (that and the high-degree theft which plunders our institutions).

The only antidote I know is a sense of community strong enough to exert the social pressure necessary to make people not pillage and (for those who do) a difficulty in finding someone to recycle or buy the goods gained through theft and a willingness of the populace to ostrascized (turn in to the authorities, prison, lynch whatever) those who do participate in the destruction of our shared infrastructure.

Maybe well find that as a nation... if not then we will find it as regions. The question is how far down we have to go before we find that community.

Cur

[MrBill]

Neighborhood Watch, Crime Stoppers and a rough dose of Frontier Justice!

[MacG]

Sorry, can't find a link, but I recall reading a historian some years back who had started to suspect that the pillaging of Rome was as much an internal affair as the works of external "barbarians".

[Ferretlover]

Explosion levels vacant house in north Minneapolis
By TERRY COLLINS, Star Tribune update: March 27, 2008
No injuries were reported after a house exploded in north Minneapolis late Wednesday.
Two adjacent houses, both vacant, were damaged from the blast shortly after 9 p.m. on the 3200 block of Colfax Av. N.
Thieves stealing copper from gas line in vacant homes

by Brian Johnson Staff Writer
Like many others in the local construction industry, Paul Berg has long been concerned about the growing problem of copper theft.
It was a serious enough problem when theft was limited to construction sites and scrap yards. But when thieves started tearing gas pipes out of private homes in search of a quick buck, the public took notice and concern turned to outrage. …
Natural gas explosions associated with copper theft add to the concern. At least four theft-related explosions and six gas leaks have been reported in vacant homes in Minneapolis and St. Paul since November 2006.
In December 2006, copper water pipes were stolen from a vacant home in north Minneapolis, causing an explosion that tore the roof off the structure. Nobody was injured. …
Stupid, stupid thieves

California Metal Thieves Target Fire Hydrants BEATRIZ E. VALENZUELA
Daily Press, Victorville, Calif
HESPERIA -- Fire hydrants are the newest target for Victor Valley scrap metal thieves.
Thieves are getting about $4 to $6 for the hydrant parts, though it costs $125 plus the cost of labor to replace the part, said Scott Weldy of the Apple Valley Ranchos Water Company. …
We have had more than 100 calls of brass caps and even the brass threading being stolen from fire hydrants in the last six months, making the hydrants inoperable," said Deputy Dan Rodriguez of the San Bernardino County sheriff's Hesperia station. …
House fire? Fire depts may not be able to respond

[wisconsin_cur]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', 'N')eighborhood Watch, Crime Stoppers and a rough dose of Frontier Justice!

[WisJim]

In rural Wisconsin, stainless steel bulk tanks (the large milk tanks that a dairy farmer stores and cools milk in, before it is picked up by the truck to go to the processing plant) are being stolen out of the farm's milk houses when the farmers aren't home. Stainless steel scrap is getting valuable.

[Ferretlover]

Gun turrets on one's house are starting to sound more attractive...

[pedalling_faster]

there are 2 large bronze statues in front of City Hall in SF (each 1 ton +) and a church on Geary with a gold roof (Russian Orthodox, i think). i wonder if either location will get robbed.

video surveillance is one adaptive measure. the way costs on digital video hardware are falling, i wouldn't be surprised to see small cameras built into the large coils of wire (etc.) that are likely targets, for example one $20 camera for every 100 yards of wire. implemented up-front (so the wire has built in transmissions lines for the cameras), or as a retro-fit.

i just saw an ad for the video game, Grand Theft Auto. I wonder when the video game industry will produce something along the lines of "Grand Theft Copper".

[topcat]

Heck with the cameras, bet they start putting RFID's on copper tubing!

[pedalling_faster]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('topcat', 'H')eck with the cameras, bet they start putting RFID's on copper tubing!

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')t least 15 U.S. states -- from California to New York -- drafted legislation in the past year to deal with the problem, from tighter regulations on scrap metals' traders to tougher penalties for metal theft, local authorities and metals industry officials say.

"In my district, we've got a lot of foreclosed homes and we've got a ton of people who are breaking into these homes, stealing the copper wiring right out of the walls," said Andy Meisner, a lawmaker in Michigan's state Legislature who plans an April 15 hearing on two bills intended to tackle the issue.

"It is a problem that is really affecting us throughout the whole state," he said. "When all the copper is taken out, the house basically becomes a knock-down. It then has a depressing impact on property values."

He said authorities in Hazel Park, a city in his district, ran a clandestine sting operation on a metal trader. "They saw a guy literally walking down the street with bundles of wire in each hand. They saw him walk into a scrap yard and walk out having sold this scrap he had obviously stolen," he said.

[BigTex]

I think you've got it wrong here MrBill. I would think that this kind of activity would be great for the economy, like hurricanes, wars and other calamities that create economic activity that would not otherwise occur.

If they caught some of the thieves, they might discover that they were mining company executives and metals sector analysts.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BigTex', 'I') think you've got it wrong here MrBill. I would think that this kind of activity would be great for the economy, like hurricanes, wars and other calamities that create economic activity that would not otherwise occur.

If they caught some of the thieves, they might discover that they were mining company executives and metals sector analysts.

[Cloud9]

WW II worked out pretty well for the U.S.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cloud9', 'W')W II worked out pretty well for the U.S.

[BigTex]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BigTex', 'I') think you've got it wrong here MrBill. I would think that this kind of activity would be great for the economy, like hurricanes, wars and other calamities that create economic activity that would not otherwise occur.

If they caught some of the thieves, they might discover that they were mining company executives and metals sector analysts.

[MrBill]

Only if you are a slave to GDP figures. I am not. Improving standards of living as per the UNs Human Development Index and investing in sustainable development and a clean environment are more important measures of economic prosperity than another 0.5% added to GDP figures.

You can create the same amount of GDP by fixing your crumbling infrastructure as you can by building something new, but less useful. It is not very sexy, but a mechanic fixing your old, but reliable car, generates the same GDP as the salesman who takes his commission on a new car. In turn that money not spent on a new car can be spent on something that improves your quality of life, like solar panels or insulation for your house, or invested, so someone else can use that money to create something of value.

The problem is that the uneducated and uninformed equate wealth creation with conspicuous consumption and not with raising living standards. That can entail doing more with less or switching from unsustainable to sustainable practices. Like diverting public funding away from highway construction and into railways.

It comes down to public policy, informed consumer choices and pressure from voters on politicians. Wealth is not bad. Without wealth creation you would have no social spending. Whereas conspicuous consumption and waste of scarce resources cannot be defended on any level except that they add nominally to GDP, but only a real cost to our environment and future standards of living.

[cube]

Some homes worth less than their copper pipes
The first 2 paragraphs says enough.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'B')ROCKTON, Massachusetts (Reuters) - Shards of broken glass outside the basement window of 31 Vine Street hint at the destruction inside the three-story home.

Thieves smashed the window to break in and then gutted the property for its copper pipes -- a crime that has spread across the United States as the economy slows and foreclosed homes stand empty and vulnerable.

"They cut it here and then pulled it right out of the wall," real estate broker Marc Charney said,...

[MrBill]

Wealth that pays for schools, infrastructure, salaries, waste water treatment, and, and, and....
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')U.S. state-tax collections rose at the slowest pace in almost five years during the past three months as the economic slump curbed sales- and income-tax receipts...

(continued)

Delaying the bond issue would have been more expensive because the district would have had to put students in modular classrooms at a cost of about $150,000 to $200,000 per six units per year, Gegenheimer said.

``We're either paying out of one hand or paying out of another,'' he said.

The Houston Independent School District, the largest public school system in Texas, sold $390 million of bonds March 10 to help renovate 133 schools, buy security cameras and add new facilities to alleviate crowding. The district has more than 200,000 students. Debt it sold that matures in 10 years yielded 3.86 percent, or 0.40 percentage point more than Treasuries.

``We needed the money because we're ready to start the projects,'' Melinda Garrett, the district's chief financial officer, said.

Albuquerque, New Mexico's water authority borrowed $55.6 million on March 19. Included in the offering were bonds maturing in 2033 with an interest rate of 5.07 percent. That compares with a 30-year Treasury that yielded 4.21 percent the same day.

The agency is using the proceeds to help finance the $443.8 million San Juan-Chama drinking water project, which will divert water from the San Juan River to a treatment plant.