One of the American left’s main causes is ridding the country’s economy of carbon. This will require vast amounts of copper.
As Sprott, a global asset manager specializing in precious metals and critical energy-transition materials, notes:
By 2050, it’s projected that the global electric grid will need to double in capacity to meet the 86% increase in electricity demand…Countries must shift their production mix to include a much higher share of greener energy sources to lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from electricity production while accommodating expanding demand. This expansion is estimated to require an annual investment of $1 trillion, accumulating to nearly $21 trillion by 2050. These upgrades necessitate a substantial amount of copper, estimated at 427 million metric tons by 2050…
The shift from internal combustion engines (ICEs) to electric vehicles (EVs) is copper-intensive and critical to decarbonizing transportation. Copper is essential in EVs, finding use in electric motors, batteries, inverters, wiring and charging stations. An EV requires 53 kilograms of copper in electric motors, batteries, inverters, wiring and charging stations, about 2.4 times more than a conventional combustion vehicle uses. This volume of wire can extend up to a mile in length. Although efforts are underway to reduce copper in EVs, demand is still projected to hit 2.8 million metric tons by 2030.
Additionally, the IEA reports that renewable energy infrastructure, including solar and wind power, needs 2.5 to 7 times more copper than fossil fuel-based technologies, depending on whether the wind installations are onshore or offshore…
Overall, as we noted in our report “Shattered Green Dreams: The Environmental Costs of Wind and Solar,”
Global copper demand will likely double, and mines will only be able to meet 70 percent of the forecasted demand. Another study for the International Energy Forum suggests that just business-as-usual needs will require 115 percent more copper to be mined over the next 30 years than has been mined in human history through 2018. Full vehicle electrification will require 55 percent more copper mines than would otherwise be needed under that baseline.
Given this imperative, it might come as a surprise to discover that, today, with a suspiciously King-like exercise of his “executive authority,” Gov. Walz has banned copper mining in northern Minnesota.
No doubt the “No Kings” crowd are dusting off their placards as I type.
This illustrates the complete incoherence of the American left; “We need to decarbonize our economy,” they say, “but we will be damned if we’ll let you mine the copper required to do so!” Even on their own terms, one can, perhaps, have a decarbonized economy or one with no copper mining; one cannot have both. The American left faces a time for choosing.
