Copper, the red metal

Copper is essential for our modern lives. All industry and technology we use on a daily basis rely heavily on the availability of copper, and our need for copper is growing. Energy production, transmission and distribution, as well as wiring of our homes and cars already takes up more than half of the copper use we today, but as we transition away from fossil fuels, we are going to have to accelerate the building of lower carbon energy sources - and this requires vast amounts of copper. So there is a great need to mine more copper, which means understanding copper deposits and the geology behind their formation. Dr Taija Torvela explores how copper is used, and where it is found in the geological environment.
This video is part of Taija's KZbin channel ‪@ourmetallicearth‬
#copper #mining #minerals #geology #energytransition #exploration #metals #criticalminerals #netzero #batterymetals #decarbonisation #earthscience #education

[@1000000trs]

I love these academic geological documentaries focusing on metals. Each one is is quite a substantial production, and so brilliantly done. Rare that a you-tube video of any kind has a such a lot of info crammed into 18 minutes, and so logically developed, and so easily digestible.

[@ourmetallicearth]

Glad you enjoy it!

[@openclockclubarchive325]

Love this series. The level and pace are great!

[@ourmetallicearth]

Thank you! 😊

[@Fusako8]

My favorite metal. Easy to source for small projects, and easy to work with fairly minimal tooling. And visually striking.

[@erics2506]

Totally enjoyable. I been scrapping copper items for fifty years. My very first job as a teen was gutting old larger apartments to make multiple smaller units saving all the old cooper and brass wires pipes and fixtures for "Free Money" Those days are long past but it gave me a unique perspective as to the value of metals that can be found everywhere and cashed in just like money 5 days a week at the scrap yard 30 minutes from me. I do mostly electronics now gold fingered boards etc.

[@carltuckerson7718]

Thank you for your attention to detail and informative videos. Happy New Year!

[@ourmetallicearth]

Same to you!

[@wolfgang_bohusch]

Nice video! One edit tip: when editind (cutting) the audio, fill the spaces between cuts in the voiceover with some "white noise" from a quiet part of the recording. The noise background is ok, but if it is interrupted by "no sound" it is quite distracting for listeners. keep on doing great videos

[@robertalan4717]

Thank you so much for this. As a former steel fabricator (welder.fitter) metallurgy is a fascinating subject for me.

[@ourmetallicearth]

Glad you enjoyed it! 😊

[@terrapinrocks]

This channel is a secret gem deposit. :)

[@neilreynolds3858]

More copper than we've mined in history in the next few decades? That doesn't sound very green. That takes a lot of energy in places in the world with no infrastructure to support it.

[@ourmetallicearth]

You're not wrong, it does take a lot of energy and at the moment most of that energy will have to be produced using hydrocarbon-based sources, but the sooner we build up the low-carbon energy infrastructure globally the sooner we can use that low-carbon energy also in mining. Call is a positive feedback loop.

[@donaldcarey114]

@@ourmetallicearth There is increasing evidence that large scale wind and photovoltiac power generation are dead ends, that is they are a net negative for the environment.

[@TheJagjr4450]

At least you are addressing the elephant in the room... The bigger issue is that the metal and mineral companies are not permitting new mines nor are they indicating any additional resources within their current portfolios in their securities filings with the relevant investment regulators, which is not very good news due to the fact that the average time from ore body discovery to mine permitting to ore extraction is 14 years, which puts us closer to 2035 for any significant output gains. Ironically I have malachite and azurite deposits on the land I live upon... some of the rocks I have dug out of the bedrock fault in the creek have weathered with the EXACT colors shown at 7:46

[@Miningpastpresentfuture]

Another excellent video. Thank you for the great visual aids. I have passed it on to several professionals in the mining industry to use to help introduce young metallurgical engineers to economic geology of copper.

[@ourmetallicearth]

Thank you for that, and very glad you enjoyed it!

[@chrisregpick]

Great video.

[@amirfatholazade1840]

great 👌👌

[@rafaelsaura5587]

In the video you give high voltage lines as an example of the use of copper, but I understand that these cables (probably because of their price) do not contain copper but mainly aluminum.

[@ourmetallicearth]

Aluminium is cheaper and lighter but doesn't conduct electricity as well as copper, high voltage cables typically have an aluminium sheath but they are mostly copper!

[@physicsdave5402]

@@ourmetallicearth I agree with @rafaelsaura5587. Please have a look at, at least, Wikipedia... check "Overhead power line". Copper is expensive & heavy. Aluminium is much lighter & cheaper. The HV transmission towers you show use HV precisely to reduce the effects of conduction losses => Power transmitted ~ (volts)*(amps). BUT conduction losses are ~(amps)^2 * (resistance). So, higher voltage at lower current has less conduction losses than lower voltage at a higher current for the same power transmission. This means using Al is actually more cost effective than using copper for HV over long distances (100's to 1000's of km). Lower voltage lines with higher currents do use copper, but theses do not (typically) run for more than a few km at the most, at least that I'm aware of.

[@plumtree1846]

I've enjoyed several of your videos over the past couple of months. Finding viable ore deposits is important. Just as important is processing the ore and minimizing waste byproducts. Are you going to make videos on this aspect of the process? For example, what are the lessons learned after mining copper and tin in Spain and southern Britain for thousands of years?

[@ourmetallicearth]

Thank you! Yes I have those types of videos planned too. I have plans for a video about processing techniques, and also for a video about mining with minimal waste and environmental damage - lessons learnt from historic mining is an important angle in that. Hoping to get onto those later this year!

[@plumtree1846]

Look forward to it. A few years ago, I started following the history of Molycorp and the Mountain Pass rare earth mine, and that got me thinking about the long term legacy of mining.

[@hefender9062]

Olen jokin aika sitten kiinnostunut sijoitusmielessä Explorereista. Erityisesti Hercules silver vaikuttaa hyvin mielenkiintoiselta. Olen pyrkinyt laajentamaan tietämystäni ja sinun videot ovat olleet mainioita, kiitos siis näistä! Mielenkiinnolla kysyn, oletko seurannut Hercules silverin projektia ja jos olet vaikuttaako se asiantuntijan silmiin myös kiehtovalta?

[@ourmetallicearth]

En ole tarkemmin tutustunut, hopea on kylla erittain mielenkiintoinen noin yleensa seka geologisesti etta sovelluksiensa takia! Maailma tarvitsee enemman hopeaprojekteja.

[@hefender9062]

@@ourmetallicearth Heillä on itse asiassa kupariprojekti tällä hetkellä. Hopean alta löytyi kuparia ja nyt tarkastellaan laajuutta, ilmeisesti mahdollisuus todella massiiviseen löydökseen.

[@TotalFreedomTTT-pk9st]

Have you done King Daddy Iron yet ? may be boring but it is in everything

[@ourmetallicearth]

Not yet but will do at some point!

[@TotalFreedomTTT-pk9st]

@@ourmetallicearth One thing I'm curious about is what - besides oxygen (ferric oxide ?) comes with the iron - like where is carbon coming in - because low carbon steel is very expensive and I've gathered that our US Steel supply has quite a bit of recycles bringing in carbon from higher carbon sources (bed angle iron - drill bits etc) and this carbon is very hard to remove -it used to be that low carbon steel was more standard around1900 because it was 'raw' - so Iron is not so rum dumb

[@ourmetallicearth]

Carbon is added to iron in the steel manufacturing stage, it doesn't naturally exist there. The carbon increases the strength of the steel. There are alternatives to carbon but yes they are much more expensive. I don't think the carbon is particularly hard to remove in the recycling process but I'm not entirely sure.

[@Muonium1]

Note there is no copper anywhere in the image at 1:40. Only aluminum, steel, and glass or ceramic. High tension wires or "conductors" have always been made of aluminum, which has sufficiently high conductivity and high strength to weight ratio appropriate to be strung long distances, minimizing support tower construction. Copper is too dense and weak for such purpose, not to mention VASTLY more expensive. In the fullness of time, copper will be completely displaced from practically all electrical transmission applications down streets and into homes, as mastery over the nano scale permits the synthesis of single wall carbon nanotubes which are over 50% more conductive than copper at a tiny fraction of the weight. We have quite some time before this occurs, however.

[@ourmetallicearth]

I'm afraid that's not accurate, the cables have indeed mostly copper cores, more expensive and heavier yes but much higher conductivity. The sheath is typically aluminium though. Aluminium cables are used locally but most cables are dominantly copper.

[@Muonium1]

@@ourmetallicearth I believe this is mistaken. Please search for the terms "overhead transmission line cross section" or some variation thereof and take a look (note the absence of black insulating overwrap, which is superfluous on these overhead cables). Overhead strung transmission lines use *steel* wire cores for the increased tensile strength, and aluminum wire sheaths for good conductivity. You are entirely correct with respect to *underground* or subsea transmission cables, which are often run for relatively short distances and do use a thick core of copper to carry the current, but note that this is largely due to the shorter distance of such cable lengths and their complete absence of need for any significant amount of tensile strength, typically being buried under ground as they are. Again an image search for "underground high voltage cable cross section" or the like reveals this fairly clearly.

[@ourmetallicearth]

Fair enough, the point still remains though that we will need a lot of additional copper (and other metals) to connect the new energy infrastructure to the grid!

[@Muonium1]

@@ourmetallicearth no question.

[@cdineaglecollapsecenter4672]

I enjoy your videos, but I can think of some other partial solutions to the problem of mineral scarcity, other than destroying salmon runs. a) people buy fewer electronic devices, and buy them less often b) people start getting smaller houses c) we raise energy prices so that fewer people are building really ridiculous energy-wasting facilities, like those for crypto and consumer AI and d} more copper recycling. It's possible that we are going to need to make some sacrifices to get to a renewable power grid, though no one wants to hear that. Also, it's an odd point of view that we should just use everything up right now and leave nothing for future generations.

[@ourmetallicearth]

Many of us could indeed consume less but the real issue is the global population, which is growing fast and many don't even have what we would consider basic comforts - decent food, reasonable housing, and so on. We can't really say they can't have them! We can't really increase copper recycling much because 70-80% of scrap copper is already being recycled.

[@cdineaglecollapsecenter4672]

@@ourmetallicearth I think that as with most resources, the question is equitable distribution. If we keep going the way we are, the industrialized countries will just buy up all the new mineral resources and the people/countries who need it won't get it anyway. In fact, all of us have to consume less insofar as we're capable. And hope we develop technologies that use fewer resources yet still provide a secure living standard. I don't like the needs of developing countries being used to promote mines that will only help the industrialized countries continue with their profligate lifestyles, while trashing the environment in the developing countries.

[@kimollivier]

HV transmission cables? Really? Surely they are made of aluminium with a steel core?

[@ourmetallicearth]

No the core is copper, the sheath is typically aluminium!

[@TotalFreedomTTT-pk9st]

About 10 years ago - out on my bike in the City I found these 4 foot 'chops' of heavy cable each made up of roughly 9 "strands" 14 gauge 'wire' which LOOKED like copper - (making no sense since 'scrappers' don't usually make mistakes and leave 'copper' any where so...) looking more closely they WERE copper jacketed IRON core High Voltage lines - running along the Rail lines - it was really the SOFT IRON I was looking for - for making Free Energy solenoids -and when I got home I looked them up and it turns out that the High Voltage also uses higher frequency and the 'power' tends to run on the outside of the wire and so you don't really need 'solid' copper -and the copper layer is very thin - I can't leave a picture on KZbin or a link - and I'm not sure they will even be useful as soft iron' since it is really not all that soft with about .2 % carbon - which is soft but not super soft which would b more like .05% - anyways -

[@TotalFreedomTTT-pk9st]

@@ourmetallicearth /MY-860875/copper-clad-steel-conductor.pdf well it shows a picture of what I found - 9 heavy 'strands' of iron core with a thin copper jacket which - as it turns out is very HARD to salvage the copper which is why the scrappers left it - - all heavy industrial stuff and yes we are ALL right - aluminum steel coated - pure copper pure aluminum - etc - any strand size - huge 32 strand cables - mind blowing - For my project ? - copper is diamagnetic meaning it would 'contain' the magnetism of the iron so I don't' think my 'soft iron' core would work - but I will test it - OurMetallicEarth you are in the right area of life - endless exploration and your video are great to sleep to - very laid back