Mineral resources is a concentration of naturally occurring solid, liquid, or gaseous material in or on the earth’s crust that can be extracted and processed into useful materials at an affordable cost. Mineral resources are essential to support sustainable economic growth and our quality of life. Therefore, it is important to have sufficient supply of materials to provide for infrastructure, buildings, energy and goods. However, since mineral resources are nonrenewable natural resource, and scarce, it is important to use them sustainably to secure their long-term conservation.
There are many reasons why we should use mineral resources more sustainably. First and foremost is to keep them for the usage our future generation. We are actually …show more content…
Indium, gallium and platinum resources are diminishing quickly and will soon be gone due to rapid development of technology. For example, Indium is used in production of LCD screens and is expected to only last around 32 years, according to US data. In addition, gallium and platinum which is being used for solar power and fuel cells respectively are said to experience the same things. Without proper management during these minerals extraction, and lack of substitute substance development, the minerals will be gone forever since it’s already in limited …show more content…
While we use these resources for industrial or personal use, these resources are slowly becoming less and less abundant. How we manage them is the most important for ensuring the sustainability of the resources for future generation. One way to use mineral resources sustainably is by reducing our dependency on it and find another renewable resources. For example, Germany is the leading country for using solar energy. Germany already installed thousands of solar panels, and they are planning to be use nothing but renewable energy by 2050. German has stayed as the top buyer of solar energy panels for several years and is expected to continue going forward in the same direction.
Besides reducing our dependency on the mineral sources, we can also use mineral resources sustainably by using new extraction technologies. Technological improvements in mining and mineral processing reduce costs and permit profitable mineral production from previously uneconomic, mineralized rock. More research should be carry out to find ways to increase the mineral extraction efficiency so that more minerals can be reached at the lesser
There are many reasons why we should use mineral resources more sustainably. First and foremost is to keep them for the usage our future generation. We are actually …show more content…
Indium, gallium and platinum resources are diminishing quickly and will soon be gone due to rapid development of technology. For example, Indium is used in production of LCD screens and is expected to only last around 32 years, according to US data. In addition, gallium and platinum which is being used for solar power and fuel cells respectively are said to experience the same things. Without proper management during these minerals extraction, and lack of substitute substance development, the minerals will be gone forever since it’s already in limited …show more content…
While we use these resources for industrial or personal use, these resources are slowly becoming less and less abundant. How we manage them is the most important for ensuring the sustainability of the resources for future generation. One way to use mineral resources sustainably is by reducing our dependency on it and find another renewable resources. For example, Germany is the leading country for using solar energy. Germany already installed thousands of solar panels, and they are planning to be use nothing but renewable energy by 2050. German has stayed as the top buyer of solar energy panels for several years and is expected to continue going forward in the same direction.
Besides reducing our dependency on the mineral sources, we can also use mineral resources sustainably by using new extraction technologies. Technological improvements in mining and mineral processing reduce costs and permit profitable mineral production from previously uneconomic, mineralized rock. More research should be carry out to find ways to increase the mineral extraction efficiency so that more minerals can be reached at the lesser