In reply to Jones Beene's message of Sat, 30 Apr 2011 08:54:01 -0700: Hi, [snip] >-----Original Message----- >From: OrionWorks - Steven Vincent Johnson > >I would love to hear various opinions on the matter of available supplies of >Nickel, particularly pertaining to the economy of actually mining the >element. How realistic of a "conservative" prediction is the 100 year >prediction? What economics are involved? > > >I looked into this recently. Presently nickel is mined from rich deposits >such as the Sudbury Basin in Canada, which were former asteroid impact sites >and have an unnaturally rich percentage. However, there are much larger >deposits called laterites which are lower grade, and seldom mined due to >comparative cost. > >These are very large tonnage, billion tons and more - but low-grade >deposits. They are located close to the surface and can supply World energy >needs for a very long time at a price of about 100/kg. (going by projections >for copper prices - which is similar in ore concentration to laterites). > >There is roughly half as much nickel as carbon on earth !
Yes, but the carbon gets recycled (albeit over hundreds of millions of years in some cases), whereas the Nickel would be "once through". According to http://kyawlinnzaw.weebly.com/uploads/4/5/1/3/4513060/ni_laterite_full_description.pdf the world's Nickel deposits (including laterite) amount to about 202 Mt of contained metal. (page 191). According to http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/world.html World energy consumption is about 500 quad / annum. This is expected to rise (see graph). If only the Ni62/Ni64 is used (together about 5% of Ni), then 202 Mt used to produce energy at 60% efficiency (because a lot would be used to produce heat at 100% efficiency), would last us for 112.7 years, assuming no growth in annual energy consumption rate, and further assuming that it is our only energy source. This amounts to a Nickel production rate of 1.8 Mt / annum, which I think is about 3 times the current rate of production. > >IOW it is very common. Scarcity is not a problem - if the price is right. > >Jones > Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/Project.html
