A New Way to Assess the Loss of Mineral Wealth: The Case of Copper

Abstract

The search for new electronic appliances, the urgent need for renewable energy technologies and on the multiple uses in the society have produced a high demand for metals. The copper claim has increased significantly in the last centuries. Chile is the world´s largest copper producer. However, the higher production of copper has been accompanied by a considerable decay of ore grades in the Chilean copper mines. That is why it is required to appropriately assess the loss of mineral (LMW) wealth. Methodologies to determine the LMW based on the second law of thermodynamics and the Exergy, have provided valuable information on the scarcity of minerals. The methodology proposed in this paper is based on the simulation of mineral processes for the concentration of copper using HSC from an average mineral composition of the leading in some mines in Chile. One approach to estimating LMW has been utilising the exergy replacement cost (ERC). Although this procedure has been effective in establishing an ultimate scenario of mineral depletion, named Thanatia, it needs to correlate appropriately with the current market conditions to develop a framework for a fairer scheme for the prices of metals. In this paper is proposed a new approach to estimate LMW for the case of copper.