Institute of Environmental Sciences , Leiden University , P.O. Box 9518, 2300 RA Leiden , The Netherlands.
Faculty of Environment and Natural Resources , University of Freiburg , Freiburg , D-79106 , Germany.
Environ Sci Technol. 2018 Apr 17;52(8):4950-4959. doi: 10.1021/acs.est.7b05549. Epub 2018 Apr 3.
This study provides scenarios toward 2050 for the demand of five metals in electricity production, cars, and electronic appliances. The metals considered are copper, tantalum, neodymium, cobalt, and lithium. The study shows how highly technology-specific data on products and material flows can be used in integrated assessment models to assess global resource and metal demand. We use the Shared Socio-economic Pathways as implemented by the IMAGE integrated assessment model as a starting point. This allows us to translate information on the use of electronic appliances, cars, and renewable energy technologies into quantitative data on metal flows, through application of metal content estimates in combination with a dynamic stock model. Results show that total demand for copper, neodymium, and tantalum might increase by a factor of roughly 2 to 3.2, mostly as a result of population and GDP growth. The demand for lithium and cobalt is expected to increase much more, by a factor 10 to more than 20, as a result of future (hybrid) electric car purchases. This means that not just demographics, but also climate policies can strongly increase metal demand. This shows the importance of studying the issues of climate change and resource depletion together, in one modeling framework.
本研究提供了到 2050 年电力生产、汽车和电子产品对 5 种金属需求的情景。所考虑的金属有铜、钽、钕、钴和锂。该研究展示了如何在综合评估模型中使用高度针对产品和材料流的技术特定数据来评估全球资源和金属需求。我们使用 IMAGE 综合评估模型中实施的共享社会经济途径作为起点。这使我们能够通过应用金属含量估计值并结合动态库存模型，将有关电子产品、汽车和可再生能源技术使用的信息转化为金属流的定量数据。结果表明，铜、钕和钽的总需求可能会增加约 2 到 3.2 倍，主要是由于人口和 GDP 的增长。由于未来（混合动力）电动汽车的购买，锂和钴的需求预计会增加 10 倍以上，甚至 20 倍以上。这意味着不仅是人口结构，气候政策也可以强烈增加金属需求。这表明在一个建模框架中，共同研究气候变化和资源枯竭问题的重要性。
