Hi Nixie,
I have moved this to everything else.
I guess it's not a surprise, everything runs out. One nice thing about copper is how much is recycled. I've made many a beer night for the boys from old copper flashings on re-roof projects. I can imagine a lot of old wire and pipes see the same fate. So how long before it really runs out?
I have moved this to everything else.
I guess it's not a surprise, everything runs out. One nice thing about copper is how much is recycled. I've made many a beer night for the boys from old copper flashings on re-roof projects. I can imagine a lot of old wire and pipes see the same fate. So how long before it really runs out?
If you need wire, just look above the suspended ceiling of any office. I'll wager that there will be a lot of old network cabling that can be recycled or re-used. Most of the time, these so-called network professionals will just string up new cable rather than trace/test/remove the old cable.
ensen.
ensen.
Don't hold your breath. We've been "running out" of something oir other for a century. Besides metals go away they just get moved around There's a fair chance the gold on your RCA turminals Once belonged to thje Inca until the Spanish appropriated, until Btitish privateers appropriated it untilit was used to buy tea in China until the Japaese or Russians appropriated it and used to to plate the RCA terminals on your 47 Lab GainCard.
In the heyday of pre-digital photography, it was said that nearly half the world's stock of silver circulated several times a year through Rochester, NY. Think KodaChrome!
In the heyday of pre-digital photography, it was said that nearly half the world's stock of silver circulated several times a year through Rochester, NY. Think KodaChrome!
Short-sighted scaremongering. Follow the money friends.
Remember the Peak Oil theory? Remember how last year we heard of discoveries that about doubled our estimated oil in the ground?
We don't know where all the copper in the world is.
By the time we actually do run out of copper, look for it to be replaced already with carbon nanotubes and whatnot.
Remember the Peak Oil theory? Remember how last year we heard of discoveries that about doubled our estimated oil in the ground?
We don't know where all the copper in the world is.
By the time we actually do run out of copper, look for it to be replaced already with carbon nanotubes and whatnot.
Not many know it but the Middle East is NOT our largest and most important supplier of oil. It's <gasp> Canada. What a terrible fate to be at the mercy (merci?) of the Canuckistani's.
I once had shares in a uranium mine. Not a great investment but I did notice that year after year "proven reserves" were always about the same. I was puzzeled until someone explained to me that "Proven reserves" has little or nothing to do with geology but a great deal to do with the SEC, audit firms and bean counters.
I once had shares in a uranium mine. Not a great investment but I did notice that year after year "proven reserves" were always about the same. I was puzzeled until someone explained to me that "Proven reserves" has little or nothing to do with geology but a great deal to do with the SEC, audit firms and bean counters.
Guys, let's keep this away from politics.I know a man in construction, hes had the experience of finding all the pipes hed put in last week ripped out and sitting by the dumpster all in a bundle.
Theres a very aggresive recycling gang operating in Blatimore. They come wearing orange vests and hard hats, set out traffic cones and systematically steal aluminium light poles. Over 130 stolen and counting.
Theres a very aggresive recycling gang operating in Blatimore. They come wearing orange vests and hard hats, set out traffic cones and systematically steal aluminium light poles. Over 130 stolen and counting.
At a utility a friend of mine worked at they found a halfway house sourced day laborer who stopped showing up to work the week before.
He was in the basement with a literal death grip on a hacksaw attached to a bus bar.
The funniest thing I ever saw on television was a security video of a man using a warehouse loader to drop a 20,000 pound coil of copper into a small Toyota pickup truck that was backed into the dock.
He was in the basement with a literal death grip on a hacksaw attached to a bus bar.
The funniest thing I ever saw on television was a security video of a man using a warehouse loader to drop a 20,000 pound coil of copper into a small Toyota pickup truck that was backed into the dock.
'Remember how last year we heard of discoveries that about doubled our estimated oil in the ground?'
Fact: Oil production peaked in--quoting from memory--1971. It has fallen steadily since and will continue to do so. Doubling or even quadrupling the miniscule fraction that is known to be in the ground pales against what has already been used and demand that is rising at such a rapid rate. It's not quite as bad as 2x0=0, but it's not good either.
You're also faced with difficulty of retrieval, sulfur content, percentage that can be refined into gasoline (not all crude is equal in this), ground subsidence (one of the two prime factors in New Orleans falling below sea level is pumping of oil [the other is the levee system which is keeping sediments from rebuilding the delta, but we'll leave that for another day]--does anyone care to calculate the indirect cost of the oil that was pumped from beneath Louisiana once New Orleans is rebuilt?), and on and on and on.
You'll note that I didn't even mention environmental degradation, pollution of ground water, global warming, etc. It's not politically correct to mention such things.
And do you really want to give the oil-rich countries that much political leverage?
Here's another factoid to put in the back of your mind: Let's assume for a moment that our national economies weren't predicated on burning hydrocarbons. Let's assume that petroleum has just been discovered. No rational, intelligent being would do something so foolish and wasteful as burn it--they would use it as feedstock for plastics and for drugs. There will eventually come a time when people look back and say,"You did what with all that petroleum? You burned it? Look at all these other incredible things you could have done with it and you burned it?"
Let me put it this way. Suppose you're marooned on an island. You've got a small stand of trees. Thirty, perhaps. Let's say they're coconut trees.
Do you:
A) Cut them down and burn them at night for warmth and light?
B) Cut them down and build a house so that you have shelter?
C) Eat coconuts for nourishment. Weave the coarse hair from the outside into crude clothing to protect yourself from the elements. Burn the shells for warmth and scatter the ashes under the trees as fertilizer to encourage the trees' growth?
"A" provides immediate gratification, but you'll soon be out of trees to burn and no more will grow. "B" takes a little more work, but provides something of longer term value--although you'll lose it the next time there's a hurricane/typhoon or tsunami and you'll be in just as bad a shape as in "A." Note that in either "A" or "B" you will starve to death fairly soon no matter how many coconuts you had stored when you cut the trees down. "C" clearly requires the most work, but will keep you alive the longest. The trees will even give you something to cling to when the waves come it, thus perhaps saving your life in a more dramatic fashion.
Current policies in most nations are a combination of "A" and "B." They pay lip service to "C" but don't actually do much about it.
Now, back to copper.
Copper is readily converted to salts (chlorine and sulfur are the primary dance partners). These salts are soluble in water and will leach away. Where do they end up? In the ocean. Dilute. Past reasonable reclamation.
Can copper be recycled? Obviously. But as a simple matter of thermodynamics, no process is 100% efficient and the loss in recycling programs is horrendous. As an example, here at work we have recycling bins for aluminum cans. They are on every floor. In many cases they stand right next to the trash cans. And yet people will throw aluminum cans into the trash even when there is a recycling bin right next to the trash can!
Copper is no better. I see copper wire in trash cans, being thrown away.
Please, people...think before you speak. Be careful where you get your facts. Getting your science from a politician is like asking your garbage collector for stock tips. Not a particularly bright thing to do. Your information comes from a scientist? That's a start, but ask who is paying his/her paycheck. Did no one learn from the tobacco companies? For years, absolutely everyone said that smoking caused cancer, heart problems, you name it. Except for a few who said that there was no evidence that tabacco caused any such thing. And who paid the nay-sayers' paychecks? Why, the tobacco companies! Golly, what a surprise! If the bread on your table comes from a tobacco company, you're going to be reluctant to bite the hand that is (literally) feeding you. The majority of the scientists who are now saying that global warming isn't a real problem are paid by...
(whisper it...)
the energy companies.
Some things never change.
Grey
Fact: Oil production peaked in--quoting from memory--1971. It has fallen steadily since and will continue to do so. Doubling or even quadrupling the miniscule fraction that is known to be in the ground pales against what has already been used and demand that is rising at such a rapid rate. It's not quite as bad as 2x0=0, but it's not good either.
You're also faced with difficulty of retrieval, sulfur content, percentage that can be refined into gasoline (not all crude is equal in this), ground subsidence (one of the two prime factors in New Orleans falling below sea level is pumping of oil [the other is the levee system which is keeping sediments from rebuilding the delta, but we'll leave that for another day]--does anyone care to calculate the indirect cost of the oil that was pumped from beneath Louisiana once New Orleans is rebuilt?), and on and on and on.
You'll note that I didn't even mention environmental degradation, pollution of ground water, global warming, etc. It's not politically correct to mention such things.
And do you really want to give the oil-rich countries that much political leverage?
Here's another factoid to put in the back of your mind: Let's assume for a moment that our national economies weren't predicated on burning hydrocarbons. Let's assume that petroleum has just been discovered. No rational, intelligent being would do something so foolish and wasteful as burn it--they would use it as feedstock for plastics and for drugs. There will eventually come a time when people look back and say,"You did what with all that petroleum? You burned it? Look at all these other incredible things you could have done with it and you burned it?"
Let me put it this way. Suppose you're marooned on an island. You've got a small stand of trees. Thirty, perhaps. Let's say they're coconut trees.
Do you:
A) Cut them down and burn them at night for warmth and light?
B) Cut them down and build a house so that you have shelter?
C) Eat coconuts for nourishment. Weave the coarse hair from the outside into crude clothing to protect yourself from the elements. Burn the shells for warmth and scatter the ashes under the trees as fertilizer to encourage the trees' growth?
"A" provides immediate gratification, but you'll soon be out of trees to burn and no more will grow. "B" takes a little more work, but provides something of longer term value--although you'll lose it the next time there's a hurricane/typhoon or tsunami and you'll be in just as bad a shape as in "A." Note that in either "A" or "B" you will starve to death fairly soon no matter how many coconuts you had stored when you cut the trees down. "C" clearly requires the most work, but will keep you alive the longest. The trees will even give you something to cling to when the waves come it, thus perhaps saving your life in a more dramatic fashion.
Current policies in most nations are a combination of "A" and "B." They pay lip service to "C" but don't actually do much about it.
Now, back to copper.
Copper is readily converted to salts (chlorine and sulfur are the primary dance partners). These salts are soluble in water and will leach away. Where do they end up? In the ocean. Dilute. Past reasonable reclamation.
Can copper be recycled? Obviously. But as a simple matter of thermodynamics, no process is 100% efficient and the loss in recycling programs is horrendous. As an example, here at work we have recycling bins for aluminum cans. They are on every floor. In many cases they stand right next to the trash cans. And yet people will throw aluminum cans into the trash even when there is a recycling bin right next to the trash can!
Copper is no better. I see copper wire in trash cans, being thrown away.
Please, people...think before you speak. Be careful where you get your facts. Getting your science from a politician is like asking your garbage collector for stock tips. Not a particularly bright thing to do. Your information comes from a scientist? That's a start, but ask who is paying his/her paycheck. Did no one learn from the tobacco companies? For years, absolutely everyone said that smoking caused cancer, heart problems, you name it. Except for a few who said that there was no evidence that tabacco caused any such thing. And who paid the nay-sayers' paychecks? Why, the tobacco companies! Golly, what a surprise! If the bread on your table comes from a tobacco company, you're going to be reluctant to bite the hand that is (literally) feeding you. The majority of the scientists who are now saying that global warming isn't a real problem are paid by...
(whisper it...)
the energy companies.
Some things never change.
Grey
maxro said:
Aaaaahhhh ye-eeeessss. I almost forgot.
If we're so concerned about burning oil, why not all pay a visit to the watercar webpage and find out how to convert our cars and other internal combustion engines to run off on-demand low-pressure hydrogen generated from ordinary water?
Let's not even mention who is trying to suppress THAT sort of thing...
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