Abstract
An expert’s analysis of the factors affecting future supply of key materials
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H. J. Barnett and Chandler Morse, Scarcity and Growth, (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press for Resources for the Future, 1963), p. 49
Barnett & Morse, op. cit., p. 10
Commission on Critical Choices for Americans, Vital Resources: Reports on Energy, Food and Raw Materials, Critical Choices for Americans Series, Vol. I (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1977), p. 131
A. L. Hammond, “The New Metallogeny: Impact on Exploration is Slow, but Some See Good Prospects,” Science, September 12, 1975, pp. 868–869
See, for example, S. G. Lasky, “The Concept of Ore Reserves,” Mining and Metallurgy, October 1945, pp. 471–474
B. C. Netschert, The Future Supply of Oil and Gas (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press for Resources for the Future, 1958), p. 4
For an excellent summary of the development of mineral resource terminology, see: J. J. Schanz, Jr., Resource Terminology: An Examination of Concepts and Terms and Recommendations for Improvement (Palo Alto, Ca.: Electric Power Research Institute, 1975)
S. G. Lasky, “How Tonnage and Grade Relations Help Predict Ore Reserves,” Engineering and Mining Journal, April 1950, pp. 81–85. After further work the U.S. Bureau of Mines concluded that for porphyry copper mines, tonnage doubles with each 0.1 percent reduction in copper concentration, “How Mining Will Have to Meet Expanding U.S. Mineral Needs,” Engineering and Mining Journal, June 1966, p. 138
O. C. Herfindahl, Copper Costs and Prices: 1870-1957 (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press for Resources for the Future, 1959), p. 239
B. S. Butler and W. S. Burbank, The Copper Deposits of Michigan, U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 144. (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1929)
U.S. Bureau of Mines, Minerals Yearbook, 1957, Vol. I (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1958), p. 426
Barnett and Morse, op. cit., p. 199
H. Brown, “Technological Denudation,” Background Paper No. 50, prepared for the Wenner-Gren Foundation International Symposium “Man’s Role in Changing the Face of the Earth,” Princeton, New Jersey, June 16-22, 1955, p. 12
H. E. Goeller and A. M. Weinberg, “The Age of Substitutability,” Science, February 10, 1976, p. 686
Excluding coal, oil, gas, stone, and sand and gravel
This energy consumption, moreover, does not include the use of explosives (which, interestingly, are never included in energy consumption statistics). In 1973 the U.S. mining industry (excluding coal) used 1.1 billion pounds of explosives. (U.S. Bureau of Mines, Minerals Yearbook, 1974, Vol. I.)
J. L. Mero, The Mineral Resources of the Sea (New York: Elsevier Publishing Company, 1965), p. 179; and J. L. Mero, “Will Ocean Mining Prove Commercial?” Offshore, April 1971, p. 128
The lack of appropriate statistics made it necessary to compare secondary supply with total apparent consumption.
For a discussion of the economics of secondary supply, see R. Adams, “Secondary Supply,” in W. A. Vogely et al., (eds.), Economics of the Mineral Industries, 3rd ed. (New York: American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical and Petroleum Engineers, Inc., 1976), pp. 208–223
“Conservation of Energy,” prepared by H. Perry, of the Congressional Research Service, for the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs of the United States Senate, Second Session of the 92nd Congress, Serial No. 92-18 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972), p. 71
Most of these cartels are described in the pioneering study of mineral cartels: W. Y. Elliott et al., International Control in the Non-Ferrous Metals (New York: The MacMillan Co., 1937), and two of the volumes in the equally classic trilogy by G. W. Stocking and M. W. Watkins: Cartels in Action (New York: Twentieth Century Fund, 1946); and Cartels or Competition? (New York: Twentieth Century Fund, 1948)
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This report was condensed from a study prepared for the 1977-78 New York University Key Issues Lecture Series. The full text will appear in the series volume to be published by Bobbs-Merrill later this year.
BRUCE C. NETSCHERT is Vice President, National Economic Research Associates, Inc. (NERA), Washington, D.C., a firm of consulting economists specializing in the application of microeconomic analysis to complex issues of business and public policy. Dr. Netschert has written many articles on energy and material supply for professional and trade journals, and is co-author of The Future Supply of the Major Metals. He has consulted widely in the area of fuel, energy, and materials supply, and serves on a number of government and advisory boards. He received his BS and PhD degrees from Cornell University.
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Netschert, B.C. The Future Availability of Raw Materials. JOM 30, 11–15 (1978). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03354377
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03354377