Why Copper Is Now One of the World's Most In-Demand Metals | WSJ
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- čas přidán 31. 05. 2024
- Copper demand has skyrocketed as the push for electrification of vehicles and energy sources continue to take over. The non-precious metal is important in the shift away from fossil fuels as it is critical for EVs, windmills, solar panels and even the entire power grid. So why aren't more companies starting new copper mines to fuel this boom in demand?
WSJ explains why copper is so important to the global economy - and how a massive shortage is threatening the green-tech transition.
00:00 Copper is an essential metal
00:31 Copper’s role in electrification
01:31 Copper’s demand
03:08 Copper shortages
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As an electrician, it's not unheard of for staging grounds to be cleared of copper overnight because thieves know that a few rolls of wire are worth literally thousands in scrap. There was also a period of time where copper was so incredibly scarce and expensive, that inferior aluminum wire had to be used and adopted into the NEC until the prices of copper weren't completely insane.
My apartment building is wired with aluminum that has a thicker gauge than copper to carry the current, but the aluminum has easy metal fatigue and breaks on bends. Also you need specially made wall sockets and switches for aluminum to avoid fire.
Yeah, nobody wants to remember anything these days that’s why we keep running in circles politically. Sad part is many still have aluminum romex and don’t have a clue and definitely don’t know why or how dangerous it can be.
@@bidenhatesamerica it’s dangerous because the wall sockets being wired to them were made for the physical properties of copper. Since that happened they realized this and now have proper specifications and ratings for aluminum
Lol we still use aluminum all the time in distribution and it’s totally fine. I can assure you utilities aren’t running copper high voltage power lines overhead. Aluminum is a problem when untrained personal start working with it. It’s just another conductive metal just isn’t as forgiving.
yeah...when I was a kid(like...30 years ago) my dad would take me to house developments where they had massive spools of copper left laying around and was basically the only reason we didn't end up homeless =/
Man, I remember when I worked in commercial construction back in 2007 and we'd have to lock up our metal dumpster because of all the people hunting copper to scrap.
It seemed like if you didnt have a hand on a copper product someone else was reaching for it.
Yes, it was much the same for us in 1992.
@@davidrodenborn5905 All well and good but it's mostly desperate junkies doing it these days haha.
chapelknight951 Tell me about it
Copper has been highly valuable for decades. People literally destroy telephone poles to extract and steal copper from them to sell to scrapyards where you can get a lot for it. It's become an epidemic, so much so they now often use alternate materials to copper whenever possible because it is simply so highly sought after by thieves.
They even go to the trouble of disguising bare copper cables as non copper ones by making the outer wires out of steel in some circumstances. The outer layer being steel makes it harder to cut the cable and it also doesn’t make it obvious that it’s copper.
Thanks, Dr Obvious
@@bidenhatesamerica It's Captain Obvious.....and Dr. Copper. Doctor Copper didn't go through 6 years of tertiary financial education to be called Mister, thank you very much.
@@Nikolaitretii Jeez, Ivan....this is a copper investing upload. Put down the vodka and go to a Ukraine invasion upload.
Oh....how's that 3 day Special Military Operation going?
In Melbourne Australia its not uncommon to hear the train line is down as thievs have stolen some copper aspect cruicial to trains
Copper price is around equilibrium on the 5 year, and cheaper than it was in 2012.
Which further exacerbates the difficulties of getting a new copper mine going today. Exploration spending is down, exploration success is massively down, (for decades now,) permitting takes forever, (if the project isn't simply rejected ala USA,) social and environmental pushback has never been trickier, and miners have to go to ever-sketchier countries with changing rules or flat-out corruption. The world totally relies on a dozen or so mega-mines, half of which are a century old.
I like doing hobby level metal casting. When I started looking for small pieces of scrap copper my eyes were opened and I started seeing all the signs of homeless people collecting scrap copper. I see piles of burned wires, smashed electronics, junk with anything copper taken out. It's amazing that I never noticed before.
You guys made an error for tesla battery packs. They will switch from 12v to 48v for the vehicule electronic system, not the high voltage propulsion battery. 48v requires smaller cable which is why it will save copper.
The main battery pack does not change.
But is t the main battery pack 48v?
Cancun, Mexico. The cleaning lady at the gym told me that during the worst part of the pandemic lockdown, people dug up the electrical wires from the street at night, stripped the copper off and skedaddled. Neighborhoods woke up with no electricity. They had to replace the buried wires with a non-copper alloy. Crazy.
Penny ≠ Copper!! It's almost all zinc. Copper costs have driven it out of the household pipe market, moving people to plastic (=made from oil) water pipes.
Pre 1982 pennies are almost all copper.
Plastic pipes (PVC plastic) are made from natural gas, not oil. So is most plastic.
The idea that oil is the major feedstock for plastics is a common misconception.
@@dixonpinfold2582 Really? Drain pipes are PVC and have been for a very long time. Previously drain pipes were often cast iron or other materials, but NOT copper. Water supply pipes used to be mainly copper and are now commonly being replaced with PEX (cross-linked polyethylene) which I believe is a petrochemical made from oil.
@@mnntropy5615 That's true. PVC, made from natural gas, is still the main choice for drain pipes, but is not used for the drinking water supply.
And overall most plastic is made from natural gas, but polyethylene is a type of plastic which is indeed made from petroleum. So what I said initially, while entirely true, was beside the point as far as substitution for copper piping is concerned. Thanks for your reply.
America doesn't have pennies, we have cents...
Pennies are in England, Australia, Denmark, Canada etc etc...
Copper: been waiting for that promotion for decades
What do you mean “now?” This has been going on since at least the start of the Millenium. In more rural areas, locals would steal copper from power substations, resulting in power outages.
I recall a case study in Economics (by G N Mankiw) - in 60s and 70s, when telephone lines began to be ubiquitous, copper was in high demand. With limited technology in mining and refining, it was predicted that world would run out of copper in next decade. Then boom, optic Fibre was invented replacing copper in digital communication industry.
Hope something similar magic happens.
Thank you,very interesting 😎
0:02 What? Since 1982, pennies are 97.5% zinc with 2.5% copper plating. You need over 7000 pennies ($70) to make 1 lb of copper ($3.80).
They showed a cent, not a penny.
America doesn't have pennies...
Gee I don’t know maybe because it’s the second best conductor of electricity behind silver for a start???
WSJ, just for future reference: Citing Kamala Harris does not add any legitimacy to any claim. She's a rookie legislator, at best.
Old landfills in western countries have probably millions of tons of metals including copper. I wonder when EU will recognize this potential and boost landfill mining to new era
I have been saying the same thing! When I was a kid (1980s) my dad would take me to the town dump every Saturday. EVERYTHING went into a hole. Every once in a while whatever was there was burned. This went on for decades. Now it is covered over but it is a concentration of all sorts of materials that could be recovered now.
What you talking about when theres Africa to loot, exploit and steal from
The problem is that everything went to landfill. EVERYTHING. Including asbestos, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), PFOA and PFOS, all of which are extremely toxic to human health and the environment. toxic heavy metals etc etc. We can barely trust mining companies to dig a a hole in simple dirt and rock without wrecking everything around them. I definitely do not trust those companies to be rooting through piles of toxic waste in search of profits.
@@yougetaspear7799you are playing the same broken vinel record again. If that is happening stop it from happening. Then take what you got and manufacture something with it. If you cannot do that stop complaining. Right now Africa can only export resources, little of anything else.
@@nelsonchinasamy9857 agreed even by force if need be and ofcourse others would wanna add value on African resources in their mother countries having weaponised the very fiat vapor printed from thinair to their sole benefit just as well
Oh so the whole “lets replace all fossil fuel cars with battery powered ones” won’t work? Who would’ve thought 🤦🏻♂️
the enviromental cost upfront is higher but the cost over time is much lower
@@pinkysweets dude… do you realize that “electric” cars actually run off of fossil fuels? Do you realize that batteries are only a storage device for energy, they don’t actually create energy? So…you want to run the math on that one again? I’ll warn you, I actually have a Degree in this field.
@@bidenhatesamerica "electric" comes from many sources, many are way enviromental friendly than gas, and better sources are coming to the market. Your argument is just EV hating BS
@@bidenhatesamerica are all the power plants run on fossil fuels this day?
@@pinkysweets debatable.
This is one of the reasons why I support advanced biofuels. Renewable diesel is already decarbonizing transportation to a far greater extent that electrifcation.
no modern slaves either.
@@aldionsylkaj9654 Definitely 👍. Thank you for speaking up.
Sometimes I wonder if mainstream “climate advocates” are called that because they actually want climate change to happen.
Save your copper people
Switch to 48v architecture in vehicles and this solves much of the problem.
Todays vehicles don't rely entirely on traditional relays or contact switch anymore so it makes perfect sense.
The problem is perhaps 20x larger than the copper-in-an-ev problem.
It’s because everything uses copper. Pipes, cables, electronics
Who paid for this? WSJ is highly talented at making stocks and market of their choosing artificially rise. Great work for the wealthy elite, congrats and nice work.
Then why is spot price about 45 cents lower than 6 months ago?
CORRECTION: Copper is considered to be a semi-precious metal.
Copper is a base metal.
Precious means that it doesn't really oxidate.
@@walli6388 so silver isnt precious?
@@borregoayudando1481 Wdym? Silver also has a positive electrode potential.
@@walli6388 it oxidizes and tarnishes. Still colloquially considered a precious metal.
"precious" is cultural slang and not scientifically bound. Like tomatoes are scientifically a fruit but cullinarily a veggie.
Wind Turbines.
Not windmills
The same people who want electrification are the same people who oppose opening new mines and expanding existing ones. Make it make sense.
Just bought 1000 oz of copper rounds to add to my silver and gold collection. Love my metals !!
It'd be nice if affordable alternatives could be developed. I'm thinking, maybe, graphene cable tech, but yeah... probably still a ways to go to get it affordable.
Aluminium, often used for transmission lines.
Hope so..
Arizona knows copper mining!
1:08 is it 4 time or twice as much?
I wonder if those smelting ovens and pots for raw copper smelting (shown here) are heated with the use of renewable energy. Please let me know.
Hey, why they are not talking about recycling of copper metal extracted from e-waste or other waste? That is not worth the effort?
no, the cost of the recycling is much more than recovered copper, then recycling e-waste they only care about gold, eveything else is just bonus
Are there any materials with scalable production with similar properties?
Sadly No
Aluminium is not too far away. Availability is way higher but resistivity is also a bit more.
@@oadka Al's properties are obv well known. It's an inferior substitute, unsuitable to most applications.
Dream house is made of copper...
Its absolutely timeless and has been around since ancient times.
God bless ❤
Insulation sucks, though...
Cents not pennies... arent even made of copper anymore.. theyre made of zinc
instead of digging/mining it out
there is lot of copper out there, in different forms, i.e. in the unused or waste products
old earphones, charging cables, old electrical appliances, you need to salvage them
and last but not the least, driving towards sustainability... there are many brand new, unsold products having copper but are not sold in a while and will never be sold
copper can be salvaged from them too
yep not to mention the millions of copper coins in circulation stop all this 1's an 2's round everything down to 5's an 0's
Hey! Scrap copper recycling! Why hasn't anyone thought of that before? Bravo, young man, bravo! 👏👏👏👏
5million tons per year Wirth tho?
@@dixonpinfold2582 sister/brother, if know the context, you will understand what i am talking about.
@@devasish204 I understood perfectly in the first place. I have (1) expert-level English comprehension and (2) detailed knowledge of global copper markets, production and recycling.
Non-precious metal is about to skyrocket itself to the precious category.
What's the price of copper in Oregon?
0:23 satisfying machine
1:06 EV require estimated 4 times as much copper as gas fueled cars and then show "graf" that ev is almost 120LB second one is 60LB yea 4 times
I noticed that as well
I'm kinda surprised that ice vehicle have half of copper needed
A poor effort here. No industry analysts, no professors, just a young tweezer-deprived staffer pontificating. And a callow voiceover amateur who says "doitch-bank."🙄 Then a quote from Elon Musk totally out of context: the reduction isn't in overall copper usage, just in the 12-volt wiring system. That made me pretty mad.
Why did you even bother?
1:00 mark, it is stated that Ev's will use four times the copper of gas powered vehicles.
Did you know that 120 is 2 times 60, not 4?
Nice
Non precious metal? Not any more.
If you need more copper then RECYCLE more.
Invest more time and money into better recycling technologies.
Everything can be reused.
Those mine protest in Peru made me a good sum of change on some call options 😂🤑
What is the current price for copper in California?
I grew up in a family of electricians and the IBEW. I've been collecting, stripping and recycling copper for decades. Easy money.
I assume you ask every single customer if you can take their scrap copper?
I'm not saying you don't, just that I work around electricians and plumbers all the time and I'm always amazed how they think anything scrap automatically belongs to them.
The customer owns whatever you are ripping out and whatever scrap is generated from new work...
Why is a copper penny worth a cent or a 1oz copper coin a 1.49?
How does it vary so much
@@Greencloud8 Minting and the desire/demand for coins makes the market for them. Raw copper sold to junk yards is a different market altogether.
@@id10t98 melt those Pennie’s raw?
@@Greencloud8 I would NOT melt them down but I would check them to see if any were collectible and worth more money. Many self checkouts at supermarkets will take them and I always get rid of some that way.
FUN FACT: per study done by US gov at current global rate of copper extraction it will take 189 years to produce one generation of technology units to electrify the United States. Don’t expect it to ever happen in the lifetime of anyone reading this comment
in short,,
EV is *not* Environmentally friendly
There has been an increase in copper mine regulations, which has made it harder for copper to be obtained
the damm climate histerics at it again?
@@josepeixoto3384 Yes sir.
Its ILLEGAL to troll the landfill for scrap metal 😂
wall street so high and mighty they think us peasants think copper is cheap! the audacity.
1:09 2x60=120
😂 Ive been saving copper for 10 years 🎉
this ad brought to you by *insert legacy car maker here *
Can use aluminium conductors but copper is still needed for electric contacts and busbars, electronics.
What about recycling the countless electronics - in ewaste facilities - that have copper in them.
Have you ever tried to turn a cake back into eggs and flour? It ain't easy or cost-effective.
That Ewaste Ben guy from Australia seems to do alright recycling it !! Check him out !
So let me get this straight, between silver, copper, lithium and nickel. The things you need for clean energy are mined cleanly right? Unlike oil or coal? What powers these mines, clean energy? Or oil and coal? Just wondering where the clean fits in all of this.
The use of a Penny as a representation of copper shows a lack of research by the Wall Street Journal.
Is it because they are only coated in copper or because it's a cent, not a penny?
Why change the thumbnail?
There is not enough copper, lithium, and cobalt to allow the foreseen 100% transition to EVs by 2035.
The 100% transition require an increase in extraction and process of the fundamental metals equal to 700% of today's level.
This is why the EV transition is a bunch of hot air...
Dumb people only consider current technology.
Not one mention of the Pebble mine project…
God forbid. The known deposit contains 80 billion lbs of Cu, not to mention the gold.
Meanwhile my country is one of the worlds largest producers of copper and we’re still poor and 3rd world.
copper, the non precious metal, that became a precious metal in the 21st century...
You’ll know we’re in trouble when they start tearing the green copper roofs off the old courthouses to build electric yogas.
Alot of countries has big copper reserves?
Chile has copper and no environmental pollution laws . 29 percent of global copper production
Probably Antarctica
You know is valuable when every abandoned building is immediately looted of its copper
ea-nasir rubbing his hands together and evil snickering rn
Me watching this as I’m stealing copper wires out of an electric substation 😮
Best company s
They can double the machinery and manpower at those mines
Lol
And what about pad space, heap leaching limits, plating capacity, mill capacity, and tailings capacity.
There isn’t a direct correlation between manpower and lbs Cu produced.
All I keep hearing is how valuable copper is and it's on the cusp of a boom but it has only languished in price since it topped on 2021. I'll believe all the hype once it starts rising again.
Have to set everything up first. CHIPS Act, ✅. CIA agent turned U.S. ambassador that met with defense minister day before Peru's president was overthrown; Monroe Doctrine, ✅.
You’d think it is suppressed on purpose
Just like silver and gold
Copper is worth more than pennies
conductivity
We don't need more cars, even if electric . Just use a bicycle
Good luck riding your bike when you have a broken leg and need to go to hospital. Have fun shifting house on your bicycle. Why don't you also just live in a cave, you would want a house built by people that have used vehicles would you? Perhaps you should stop using anything that has plastic made from oil as well, like your phone, TV and computer. Really want you want is the dark ages again.
A bicycle is just perfect if everything you need is within a mile radius of your home and you don’t have kids.
@@farticlesofconflatulation 3.5 miles is reasonable for me . That's the distance from my home to the dentist.
1:44 funny, how many copper mines in the U.S. are still waiting for permits.
Windmill ?
Hopefully Ea Nasir doesn’t sell us low quality copper 😒
If wall street promoting copper, people gonna steal copper metal.
get copper from electronic waste
I could break an arm or a leg for a copper or two..
This is not about environmental, it’s about marketing.
Because elctristy car needs that coper
Copper now at 10,000 per ton
Darn I should have kept my jar of pennies (Canada use to have pennies make from copper) use to make a jar big jars of them. But have them away when I move since I have to roll them up and deposit to the bank
Now that telecom companies are rolling out fiber… can you imagine how many tons of copper can be pulled off the telephone poles… time to mine the poles 😂
And from underground.
And people hate on me for picking up pennies
Why promote more mines ?
But silver’s better conductor of heat and electricity than copper!
Within 6 days!
Just mine the dripstone caves. It's not that hard.
Why most of your videos sound are low?
So that are eardrums can bleed when the ad plays at the end of the video
It's true¡¡Chile has the major reserves of copper in earth¡¡¡In my view,copper outlook remains price-positive in the long term¡¡Copper moves money;;information;energy and money(A lot of money globally)¡¡We are living a second commodities super cycle so strong that is important to have forecasts about its timing when we are under climate change all over the world¡¡I think that we 'll have a new copper prices peak like in 1974(March 24) when copper prices has achieved a range=US$8,74 /TON¡¡US$16,5-US$20,5 /TON???Today we have lack of copper¡¡To increase mining exploration investments is the key driver to look for new mines and deposits¡¡Without exploration there's not nothing¡¡Chile is a very rich geologycal source(Meatllic and Non-Metallic resources)¡¡Base metals chinese demand is =35%-45% every year all over the world due its serius demographic problem¡¡Chile=COPPERLAND¡¡Best of luck guys¡¡
Which country has large reserve of copper
Chilie
so the next time i visit an abandoned building ill yank the cables to sell the copper :)
Your bail should be low so you'll only spend a night in jail...
Thanks to prices, South Africa is losing vast amounts of power cabling, to the extent that people are going hungry or freezing. Of what use is freedom to a corpse?
KGHM 📈📈📈
And yet, still no use for copper in Minecraft :(
But anyway,humans are brilliant and can come up with solutions to any problem.
Im sure we will solve this demand problem in time.