EoW March 2009

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Let’s hear it for copper!
I recently picked up “Cradle to Cradle:
Remaking the way we make things,” a
book by Michael Braungart and William
McDonough, and a fact caught my attention:
“Copper in British incinerated waste is worth
about £80million a year – and new copper is
much more rare than oil.”
EuroWire readers are probably already
aware of this, but I simply hadn’t thought of
copper in such stark terms. We worry about
the decline in oil reserves, but we should
be equally concerned about the decline in
industrial metals. Peak copper, like peak oil,
is inevitable; so I began to take an interest.
I learned that, having been in use for over
10,000 years, it is estimated that 95% of
all mined and smelted copper has been
extracted since 1900 and, anticipating 2%
growth in demand, per year, we probably
have only 25 years’ worth of reserves.
The Copper Development Association
website states: “Copper is essential to
technology, enabling peak performance
from advanced microprocessors and other
miniature components that drive the digital
economy of today and tomorrow.” Copper is
an excellent thermal and electrical conductor
and, with energy efficiency increasingly
in mind, these properties are of huge
importance.
Technology is not the only area to make
demands on copper. Do you know, for
example, that bacteria cannot grow on a
copper surface? Copper pipes are effective
against Legionnaires’ disease, and brass
doorknobs disinfect themselves of most
bacteria within 8 hours. Copper can combat
MRSA; the US EPA has 275 alloys with
over 65% copper content registered as
antimicrobial materials. Ancient Egyptians
(around 2,400BC) seem to have used copper
for sterilising wounds and drinking water.
The pressure appears to be off copper for
the time being, stocks are high while prices
and demand are low, but that situation is set
to change as soon as the industrial economy
begins to improve. In the meantime, apart
from being essential in plants and animals
to maintain good health, copper is heavily
employed in chemistry, art, cookware and
preservatives, for coinage, ammunition and
biomedicine.
It behoves us all
to preserve and
appreciate this
amazing metal.
Let’s hear it for
copper!
Gill Watson
The International Magazine
for the Wire and Cable Industries
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