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How do Materials Affect Energy Sustainability ? Energy Limits Materials Availability

How do Materials Affect Energy Sustainability ? Energy Limits Materials Availability esp. Sustainable Availability ✔ but …. Do Materials Limit Energy Availability, esp. Sustainable Availability ? Igor Lubomirsky and David Cahen.

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How do Materials Affect Energy Sustainability ? Energy Limits Materials Availability

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  1. How do Materials Affect Energy Sustainability ? Energy Limits Materials Availability esp. Sustainable Availability ✔ but …. Do Materials Limit Energy Availability, esp. Sustainable Availability ? Igor Lubomirsky and David Cahen

  2. Sustainable Energy availability defines the range of Materials that can be used sustainably but what about the inverse i.e., does sustainable materials availability affect sustainable energy availability ? How will transitioning to new energy technologies affect materials production and consumption? Do we have the technological abilities to adapt? If yes, how?

  3. Why do we have to consider these questions ? Because energy consumption is highly specialized. World Oil Energy Consumption by Sector, 1973-2010

  4. Why do we have to consider these questions ? If a technologically and economically viable energy alternative exists, can it be implemented and if it can, to what extent* and how fast?** ------------------------------------- * ≤ few %, or 10  few 10s of % of global energy use ? ** weeks, months, years, decades ?

  5. Postulate Transition to new technologies requires diversion of materials and energy • Questions: • How much energy can be diverted without • majordisruptions to living standards? • how flexible is energy consumption structure? • 2. Can limitations on materials availability • affect (energy) technology transitions ?

  6. Well .. what is energy used for? Why do we have to consider these questions ? Because energy consumption is highly specialized. (= most of the “industry” part) 2010

  7. Can some of this energy be redirected? Consider Transportation(nearly 30% of total)? Only~8%of personal fuel consumption is“purely”recreational (~1.6% of all transportation, 0.5% of total)! Energy usage in transportation in the US 2010 “Hidden costs of energy; Unpriced consequences of energy production and use”, The National Academies press, Washington DC (2010)

  8. Can some residentialor commercialservicesenergy use be redirected? Residential? (~ 25 % of total) Major fraction (>85%) is for heating and air conditioning. Commercialservices? (~ 10 % of total) Energy consumption can be cut … at expense of important services ----------------------------------------------- From past* experience ~10% ( 3.5% of total) *: e.g., 2008/9 “Hidden costs of energy; Unpriced consequences of energy production and use”, The National Academies press, Washington DC (2010)

  9. Can some of the energy for materials processing be redirected? “Hidden costs of energy; Unpriced consequences of energy production and use”, The National Academies press, Washington DC (2010)

  10. Production of 5 materials requires > 50% of all energy for industry / materials processing 2010 (Haber-Bosch) (Hall-Héroult) 3%(15%) > 4% (> 30%) 1.3% (6%) 1.4% (7%) 2% (10%) 6% (30%) Because these 5 materials are vital, only a small part of the energy used for industry can be really diverted

  11. Can energy expenses for materials processing decrease with time? YES, but it takes time…* * e.g., 3-D Printing

  12. Decreasing energy cost of material extraction from ore pig iron 1800 2008 energy intensity (MJ/kg) TD limit production (x 106 tonnes) Al smelting 1890 2009 from: 0000000 energy intensity (MJ/kg) TD limit production (x 106 tonnes)

  13. The importance of “embodied energy” of materials embodied energy (MJ/kg) Price of material (US$/kg) world production/consumption (x106 tonnes) embodied energy (MJ/kg) From: embodied energy (MJ/kg) Dilution (1/concentration)(x106 tonnes)

  14. Still, the fraction of materials in the total energy balance is likely to increase. WHY? Still, the fraction of materials in the total energy balance is likely to increase, because improved extraction technology is offset by decreased quality and ore exhaustion Gupta and Hall.. Energy cost of materials.. COPPER Gordon, R. B., Bertram, M., and Graedel, T. E.: Metal stocks and sustainability, PNAS, 103(5), 1209 (2006).

  15. Still, the fraction of materials in the total energy balance is likely to increase, and because of increased energy cost of extraction with decreasing ore quality COPPER COPPER Energy and greenhouse gas implications of deteriorating quality ore reserves; T.Norgate and S. Jahanshahi; CSIRO Minerals/Centre for Sustainable Resource Processing; URL : http://www.minerals.csiro.au

  16. Still, the fraction of materials in the total energy balance is likely to increase, because discovery of new ores does not compensate for exhaustion Gupta and Hall.. Energy cost of materials.. COPPER Gordon, R. B., Bertram, M., and Graedel, T. E.: Metal stocks and sustainability, PNAS, 103(5), 1209 (2006).

  17. Can materials consumption be restricted by increased efficiency of their use?

  18. Material intensity* decreases steadily* quantity of materials per unit of product decreases) USA UK Japan Does it mean that materials consumption will decrease? The socio-metabolic transition. Long term historical trends ... F.Krausmann et al…

  19. Well,…materials consumption / capita INCREASES because … living standards rise Mineral/fossil Domestic Materials Consumption Biomass Krausmann at al… 2009

  20. and, thus, absolute materials consumption accelerates exponentially also per capita!! F. Krausmann , …. , M. Fischer-Kowalski, Growth in global materials use, GDP and population during the 20th century, Ecological Economics, 68(10), 2696-2705 (2009).

  21. Can materials consumption be restricted by increased efficiency of their use? Maybe, but it’ll take time…

  22. Availability of materials Can supply of materials be increased rapidly if technological need arises?

  23. Natural Abundance of Elements in Earth’s Crust can be misleading

  24. Price scales as a power law with abundance John R. Boyce, Biased Technological Change and the Relative Abundance of Natural Resources

  25. Production volumes should also scale with abundance Source of data: USGS, EIA, CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, others

  26. Availability of materials produced as by-products Can the supply of materials that are (mining) by-products* be increased rapidly if technological need arises? * contrast Se, Te, Ga, Cd,In,with primary (mining) products such as Fe, Cu, Al, Zn, Sn, Pb, cement, phosphate

  27. How does the need for materials that use mining by-products affect abilities to switch to renewable energy sources?

  28. Let’s look at materials for solar cells (valid until we pro-/re-gress[ed] to Pb…)

  29. Material’s availability for (thin film) PV: CdTe, CIGS ppm ABUNDANCE in earth’s crust tonnes/yr Annual production of some “PV elements” COST $ / tonne L. Peter, Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A (2011) 369, 1840–1856 doi:10.1098/rsta.2010.0348 Data for some thin film “PV elements”

  30. Annual production of Te in 2010 is 150 tonne (from Cu refinement) Current recovery rate is 33–40% Increasing installed CdTe PV capacity from current 0.01 TWpe to 0.1 TWpe requires a few times increase in Cu production. In 2008 Cu production used 0.08% of world energy. Increasing production by a few times will not be possible (quickly). Data from Minerals Yearbook ( US Geological survey) and Fthenakis, V.: Sustainability metrics for extending thin-film photovoltaics to terawatt levels, MRS Bulletin, 37(4), 425 (2012).

  31. Similar calculations can be done for other materials Increase in Ga (or In) production requires increase in Al production Seems practically impossible How large can the increase be? Only 10% of Al producers extract Ga But Si, Ti, Pb and organics… are available in really large quantities Data from Minerals Yearbook ( US Geological survey)

  32. Listed energy cost of the byproducts (excluding price of primary product) Gupta and Hall.. Energy cost of materials..

  33. So, where does this leave us? (large) increase in by-product production requires (large) increase in production of corresponding primary product maybe possible (or find alternatives), but not on short time* scales * weeks /months/few years

  34. Can recycling help? Yes, at least partially Current recycling Apparent Extraction Level (%)Efficiency (%) Pb>90 2 Fe 55-65 23 Al 40-50 15 Sn>50 12 Mg >40 7 Cu >25 3 Asphalt >75 -- (in USA) Ammonia (fertilizer) none -- Cement ( concrete) minor -- 2010

  35. But sizeable fraction of materials (still) can’t be / aren’t recycled (Haber-Bosch) (Hall-Héroult) Recycled already >50%

  36. Conclusions: Sustainable energy availability  sustainable materials availability? Sustainable energy availability is not exactly or always sustainable materials availability • We will need time to have flexibility in our ability to divert energy resources to new technologies. • Whether or not we can increase production of materials will depend on abundance and on if they are by-products. • Recycling can provide partial relief for a lot, though not all “major” materials. So, here is your challenge: We need new ideas

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