| Popis: |
Raw materials are the base for an economic stability and steadily increasing industrial development of a country. In the scope of sustainable development the availability of non-renewable natural resources has been discussed controversially for decades. In the context of sustainable development the evaluation/analysis of raw material flows helps to identify options for a resource sensitive supply and an efficient use of metallic raw materials. Ore deposits represent the base of the primary metallic material flow. Therefore, specific geological and mineralogical aspects of ore deposits characterising the beginning of a material flow analysis will be identified and analysed. The example of copper ore shows that geological characteristics directly effect subsequent technical processes such as mining, processing and smelting. The analysis of geological and mineralogical ore deposit characteristics enables to identify indicators in order to measure sustainability according to the Agenda 21. Both, characteristics and indicators, are used to assess the availability of raw materials. Current operating mines, as well as, in the future producing mine sites are included in a global assessment. The analysis of the production state and the associated results lead to a first evaluation and characterisation of the future copper demand and supply. Based on the criteria ore deposit type, production state, geographical setting and the availability of data, the following geological characteristics were analysed for the production year 1998: Copper minerals and copper contents, worthy by-products, rock solidity, waste/ore-ratio, recovery grade, copper production and ore reserves. Indicators were defined and analysed as follows: annual copper production, static and dynamic life time of the ore reserves, dependency of the availability of raw materials by metal contents, copper production/clarke value-ratio, net smelter return, export dependency on copper production of countries, dependency of the gross domestic product on copper production, and copper production/land area- ratio. The results gained by the developed method lead to a first assessment of the present and future copper supply. The economic and ecological significance of the chosen geological characteristics and ore deposit types are discussed with regard to the concept of sustainable development. The effects of a possible substitution of currently operating monometallic copper mines by present producing polymetallic copper mines are calculated. The model quantifies the present availability of copper ore and the primary copper production. |
