We live in a world with finite materials even though we do not behave accordingly
The linear economic model we know today consists of extraction, production, consumption and disposal. Since the 19th century, economic growth has been based on an ever-increasing extraction of natural resources, a growing production of standardized goods, an ever-increasing consumption and renewal of these goods, and their disposal at the end of the race.
The extraction of natural resources includes both non-renewable resources, such as mineral raw materials and fossil fuels, as well as renewable resources such as air, water, soil or fauna and flora.
The demographic and economic explosion of the 20th century and the advent of mass consumption with cheap and easily replaceable products have put too much pressure on our environment and are now sounding the death knell of this linear economy.
Indeed, this linear economy has overlooked two important points: our natural reserves are limited and nature needs time to regenerate and make new resources available.
According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the world population is expected to reach 9 billion people by 2050 and the global economy is expected to quadruple, resulting in an increasing demand for energy and natural resources.
In 1900, we consumed 7 Gt of raw materials worldwide, in 2000, we consumed 50 Gt (Krausmann, 2009) and in 2020, 85 Gt. Projections suggest 183 Gt in 2050 (UNEP, 2016). Our planet will not be able to respond to such an explosion of demand.
Indeed, according to scientific experts, at this pace of extraction, some raw materials will no longer be available in the next 50 years. In 2017, Ademe published a research paper saying that the “burnrate” indicator - which is the ratio between the known reserves (R) at a given time and the mine production (P) at that same time – was about to be reached for some materials and consequently that the number of years of available production for those materials are limited.
The figure above shows, for some minerals, on the x-axis the R/P ratio calculated for 2016 and on the y-axis the same R/P ratio but this time assuming that the growth in the consumption rate of mineral materials is not constant but continues to increase steadily and similarly to the period 2000-2016.
The mineral elements identified in the orange zone are those that could be in short supply in the next 20 years if demand continues to grow in the same way as between 2000 and 2016 and in the absence of new exploitable deposits (vs. between 10 and 40 years if we consider that future consumption is similar to that of 2016). The mineral elements concerned are antimony (Sb), diatimites (Dia), tin (Sn), zinc (Zn), gold (Au), silver (Ag), lead (Pb), strontium (Sr), wadalite (W).
The mineral elements identified in the blue zone are the minerals that we could run out of between 20 and 30 years. The mineral elements concerned are nickel (Ni), boron (B), bismuth (Bi), copper (Cu), manganese (Mn), cobalt (Co), selenium (Se), niobium (Nb), molybdenum (Mo), etc.
The metal with the lowest R/P ratio is antimony (Sb) with a shortage expected in 12 years. Antimony is increasingly used in lead-acid batteries for cars and as a flame retardant in plastics to replace bromine. At the other end of the spectrum, supply predictions for rare earths (REE), beryllium (Be), platinum (Pt) and palladium (Pd) exceed 200 years based on current known reserves.
The supply of certain minerals could therefore become a problem in the coming years.
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RESOURCE DEPLETION OR SHORTAGE?
It is important to distinguish between resource depletion and shortage.
Resource depletion occurs when a resource is disappearing completely from the Earth's surface and cannot be renewed. In the case of mineral resources, resource depletion is unlikely: our knowledge of mineral reserves is still limited to the superficial part of the earth's crust and mining exploration allows the regular discovery of new deposits. The reserves exist but the question is whether exploitation of these reserves is possible, technically and economically. If we need to go deeper in the earth’s crust, the balance between the efforts (technical, human and financial) and the mineral use might be negative.
If exploitation is not possible for technical or profitability reasons, we may then face a shortage situation. This shortage may be temporary (or not): the increase in the price of an ore or the discovery of new techniques may make the exploitation of certain deposits profitable. The shortage is therefore linked to market conditions rather than to the existence of the ore in nature.
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The same is true for renewable natural resources. The depletion of natural resources is pointed out every year by an NGO, The Global Footprint Network - which calculates the Earth Overshoot Day, which marks when humanity's demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year. This is indeed the depletion of renewable resources, since we consume resources without giving them time to renew themselves, constantly reducing the available stock on Earth. The example of fishing illustrates this phenomenon very well: the industrial fishing carried out for several decades has led to 75% of fishery resources being fully exploited, already overexploited or heavily overexploited. This overexploitation leads to a decline in fish resources, as the fish do not have the time to reproduce quickly enough to counterbalance the effects of fishing. To stem this decline in fish stocks, moratoriums are imposed or bans are imposed when certain species are considered to be on the verge of extinction (this is the case for the whale, which has been a protected species since 1986). However, some specialists consider that it is too late for some species to be saved.
Since 1970, the world is in an ecological deficit. In 2019, Earth Overshoot Day3 was on July 29th, which means that 1.7 Earth planets were needed to support humanity's annual demand on the ecosystem versus only one planet in 1970. Since 2001, this date is moving on average 3 days earlier per year4. Should the global population reach 9.6 billion by 2050, the equivalent of almost three planets could be required to provide the natural resources needed to sustain current lifestyles.
Therefore, the linear model of producing more and more and throwing away large amounts of waste, without any recycling, is in contradiction with the planetary limits. The consumer society has finally given rise to a society of waste.
Global waste production was estimated to be 1.3 billion tonnes per year in 2012 vs 2.01 in 2018 (+55%) and is expected to grow to 3.40 billion tonnes by 2050 under a business-as-usual scenario (+160%)5. This high increase will come mainly from developing countries and continents (Asia and Africa).
Amongst these wastes, some are recyclables, such as paper, cardboard, plastic, metal and glass: they represent from 16% of waste streams in low income countries to 50% in high-income countries. Despite this high recyclable rate, only one-third of waste in the high-income countries is recovered through recycling and composting.
As of 2018, it is estimated that globally about 37% of waste is disposed of in some type of landfill, 33% is openly dumped, 19% undergoes materials recovery through recycling and composted and 11% is treated through modern incineration.
While developed countries have been emphasizing sorting and recycling for the past decade and therefore have better recycling and recyclability rates than developing countries, the results are not so great. In 2016, in Europe, about 60% of discarded materials were either put in a landfill or incinerated while only 40% were recycled or reused.
Thus, despite an improvement in recycling rates in Europe over the last ten to twenty years, recycling of certain materials is still low: the recycling rate of electrical and electronic waste and plastics was just over 40% in 2016. In addition, manufacturers make very little use of recycled materials in their products: on average only 12% of material resources used in the EU in 2016 came from recycled products and recovered materials - thus saving extraction of primary raw materials.
Facing these disappointing figures, it is urgent to review the way we produce in order to ensure better product recyclability, right from the design stage, but also better sorting and a better recycling rate. This will allow the development of a real market for secondary raw materials, thus limiting the environmental impact of manufacturing production, and in particular the carbon footprint.
Indeed, the manufacturing and transport of products contribute strongly to global warming, even though the carbon budget we have at our disposal is limited if we want to limit global warming to 1.5°C in 2100, in accordance with the Paris Agreement. Respecting this carbon budget implies a reduction of global CO2 emissions, either through products that consume less energy and natural resources or through a decrease in our production and consumption of goods.
The Circular Economy can be a great tool to limit global warming.