Assessing Mineral Resource Scarcity in a Circular Economy Context

Due to humanity’s dependence on metal resources there are growing concerns regarding impacts related to their potential scarcity, both for current and future generations. The vision of a more circular economy suggests that extending the functional use of metals through measures aiming for resource-efficiency (RE) such as increasing technical lifetime, repairing and recycling could reduce mineral resource scarcity. However, evidence of this is limited. In addition, there is limited understanding regarding on what principles metals can be prioritized when assessing mineral resource scarcity. The aim of this thesis is to provide knowledge on mineral resource scarcity impacts of RE measures applied to metal-diverse products and on which conditions they depend. This is achieved by: 1) studying RE measures from a life cycle perspective; 2) comparing principles of prioritization between metals on which mineral resource scarcity impacts are assessed and 3) analysing how such principles (of prioritization) can affect conclusions regarding RE measures applied to metal-diverse products. The research is conducted through case studies, syntheses of literature and method development within the methodologies of life cycle assessment, material flow analysis and criticality assessment. \ua0Results indicate that effects of RE measures depend on a number of product characteristics and real-world conditions. RE measures can both increase and decrease mineral resource scarcity impacts compared to business as usual and effects vary greatly between metals. RE measures based on use extension e.g. reuse of laptops, repair of smartphones, and increasing technical lifetimes of LED lighting, have been indicated to reduce impacts through two principal features: use extension, and, increased functional recycling. However, there are risks of increasing mineral resource scarcity impacts if RE measures require additional metal use, product use extensions are short and if functional recycling is lacking. For example, repair of smartphones risks to increase the use of metals in commonly replaced components such as screens. Because of the varying effects on different metals, implementation of RE measures requires prioritizing some metals over others. The principles of prioritization give diverging results, and, are sometimes unclear and methodologically inconsistent. The thesis clarifies how they relate to concepts such as depletion, criticality, rarity and scarcity. Further it suggests that, although mineral resources are fundamentally stock resources, they can pose stock, fund and flow problems. Distinguishing between these different problems in distinct methodologies is conducive to purposive and complementary assessment by resolving methodological inconsistencies and providing accurate terminology. In the long term, scarcity is most purposively addressed by focusing on depletion of ecospheric stocks. Accordingly, the Crustal Scarcity Indicator is proposed to assess potential long term scarcity in life cycle assessment, alongside other environmental impacts. In the near term, potential scarcity for nations, industries and companies, as commonly assessed in criticality assessment, is most purposively addressed by focusing on technospheric circumstances, such as geopolitics, which can disrupt technospheric resource flows. In medium term, secondary resources in technospheric funds could be relevant, especially, with the advent of a more circular economy. Altogether, it is recommended that implementation of RE measures to metal-diverse products are based on analysis of product characteristics and real-world conditions and that effects of RE measures are assessed by methodologies which distinguish between mineral resource flows, funds and stocks so that well-informed prioritizations between metals can be made

Towards comprehensive assessment of mineral resource availability? Complementary roles of life cycle, life cycle sustainability and criticality assessments

Regarding mineral resources, there is ambiguity around concepts such as scarcity, rarity, criticality and depletion and associated assessment methods. This paper investigates three method groups: life cycle impact assessment (LCIA), criticality assessment and life cycle sustainability impact assessment methods. The aim is to clarify how these method groups and concepts relate and their potential roles in a comprehensive mineral resource availability assessment. The study finds that their modeling approaches and practical implementations are sometimes misaligned with what they aim to assess. This results in similarities between methods from different method groups. Some LCIA-methods include elements which belong to criticality assessment, which could explain some of the ambiguity. A reason for misalignment is a lack of distinction between mineral resource stocks, funds and flows. The lack thereof also results in invalid impact pathway cause-effect chains and imprecise terminology allowing for misunderstandings in the “resource debate”. Distinguishing between mineral resource stocks, funds and flows resolves misalignments within methods and between method groups and, in turn, ambiguity around concepts such as scarcity, rarity, criticality and depletion. It follows that long-term scopes need to include assessments of depletion of ecospheric stocks. Methods focusing on factors which represent or can influence magnitude and location of technospheric flows are suitable for short term scopes. Different types of technospheric funds, such as resources in active use, end of life products and landfills, can be relevant in short, medium and long-term scopes. Altogether, assessments of stocks, funds and flows are complementary parts of a comprehensive mineral resource availability assessment

Short and long-term mineral resource scarcity impacts for a car manufacturer: The case of electric traction motors

The importance of metals for modern society and future trends puts pressure on companies to handle issues concerning potential mineral resource scarcity (i.e. deficiency in quantity compared with demand). Companies see the need to handle such potential scarcity both in the short-term (is the availability constrained for our current products?) and the long-term (is our current use affecting the availability for future generations?). This study aims to examine the use of complementary methods for short and long-term scarcity in a company context, through a case study on permanent magnet electric traction motors, to provide both empirical and methodological insights. To mitigate long-term scarcity impacts, the results point to copper, neodymium and to some extent dysprosium as priority. These metals contribute to a large share of such impacts both due to themselves and their companion metals. In the short-term, neodymium and dysprosium, which are often regarded as critical (i.e. high supply disruption probability and high vulnerability to supply disruption), were found to be substitutable in the electric motor, reducing their criticality. Instead, the electric motor was most vulnerable to a potential supply disruption of iron and silicon because of no or low substitutability in electrical steel. Methodologically, these perhaps unexpected results, demonstrate that criticality requires a more context-specific assessment than often applied, especially regarding substitutability. By using complementary methods, decision-making about potential mineral resource scarcity impacts in company contexts could become more comprehensive and distinctly address both short and long-term scarcity impacts

Resource and Environmental Impacts of Resource-Efficiency Measures Applied to Electronic Products

Natural resources such as ecosystems, land, water and metals underpin the functioning of economies and human well-being, and are becoming increasingly scarce due to growth in population and affluence. Metals are increasingly demanded for their specific properties as modern technology develops. The dependence on metals is of growing concern due to the environmental impacts related, for example, to energy use and local impacts from mining, as well as the scarcity risks posed by socio-economic, geological and geopolitical constraints.Thus, there is a clear need to use metals and other natural resources more efficiently. The vision of a circular economy has been proposed as a way to do this, for example by improving durability, reusing, repairing and recycling. Such so-called resource-efficiency (RE) measures are commonly assumed to be environmentally beneficial, although the evidence is not plentiful. It is plausible that focusing on recirculating products and materials could shift burdens to other environmental impacts or life cycle stages. It has therefore been argued that a life cycle-based approach, such as in life cycle assessment (LCA), is useful to critically assess the environmental implications of RE measures. LCA aims to quantify the environmental impacts of products over their entire life cycles - from cradle to grave - assessing a wide range of impacts such as toxicity, climate change and metal resource use. For metal resource use, however, there are a number of perspectives as to what constitutes the actual environmental problem. These perspectives are represented in a variety of life cycle impact assessment methods (LCIA) which have previously been shown to give diverging results. Electronic products are emblematic of metal resource use challenges since they deploy a broad spectrum of scarce metals. This thesis aims to provide knowledge on the potential for RE measures to reduce the environmental impacts of electronic products, by addressing the following research questions: (1) What resource-efficiency measures result in reduced potential environmental impacts and resource use – for what types of products and under what conditions? (2) How does extended use of electronic products through design for increased technical lifetime, reuse and repair affect environmental impacts, particularly metal resource use? (3) How does the application of different LCIA methods for metal resource use influence interpretations of resource-efficiency measures applied to electronic products? This thesis builds on three appended papers which are all based on comparative assessments of resource efficiency, studied as resource use and environmental impacts per function delivered, using LCA and material flow analysis. The results indicate that extended use of electronic products through increasing technical lifetimes, reusing and repairing, is generally resource-efficient. Exceptions may occur, however, if extended use is insufficient to motivate impacts from producing more durable products or spare parts. Use extension of electronic products leads to resource efficiency in two distinct ways: through the intended use extension and by increasingly steering material flows into recycling. Further resource efficiency could be realised by combining RE measures over the entire life cycles of products. With regards to metal resource use, the choice of LCIA method can influence the interpretation of the results of RE measures for electronic products. Therefore, it is advisable to use several complementary LCIA methods to minimise the risks of overlooking potentially important resources issues. Furthermore, better understanding and transparency of such issues is valuable in order to provide more comprehensive information to decision-makers

Effects of circular measures on scarce metals in complex products – Case studies of electrical and electronic equipment

Circular measures such as long-life designs, reuse, repair and recycling have been suggested for prolonging scarce metal life cycles and reducing the dependence on primary resources. This paper explores to what extent circular measures could mitigate metals scarcity when adopted to complex products. Based on three real cases, the effect of extending the use of laptops, smartphones and LED systems before recycling are assessed for between 7 and 15 scarce metals using material flow analysis. As expected, benefits can be gained from such extensions, but, importantly, differ substantially between metals since they occur in various components with various service lifetimes and functional recycling rates vary. Notably, risks of flipping the ranking in favor of short use before recycling are identified: if service lifetimes are short, designs are metal-intensive or if metal contents differ between products. Furthermore, regardless of measure, sizable and varying losses of each metal from functional use occur since all products are not collected for recycling and all metals are not functionally recycled. Thus, neither use extension measures nor recycling can alone nor in combination radically mitigate metals scarcity and criticality currently. Overall, it is a challenge to target the multitude of scarce and critical metals applied in complex products through circular measures. Careful analysis beyond simplified guidelines such as \uf6R frameworks” are recommended. As the importance of scarce metals availability and the attention to the circular economy are expected to continue, these insights may be used for avoiding efforts with unclear or minor benefits or even drawbacks

Effects on metal resource use from reusing laptops - A comparison of impact assessment methods

Proposed measures of the circular economy are assumed to be environmentally favourable but there is limited empirical evidence on how this actually works in practice or if it is true. A life cycle-based approach has been argued useful for critical assessment of circular economy measures. In life cycle assessment, several perceptions exist regarding what the environmental problem with metal resource use consists of, manifesting in differing impact assessment methods. Since these methods have been shown to give diverging results it is plausible that the choice of LCIA-method could have significant implications for the assessment of circular economy for products such as laptops. Except for recycling, there are no comparative assessment studies of circular economy measures that deploy complementary LCIA-methods on metal resource use.A life cycle assessment was conducted studying reuse as mediated by a resale and refurbishment company, using several LCIA-methods in parallel. This served to find which metals that are important in laptops depending on LCIA-method and how metals may benefit from reuse. Second-hand laptops were deemed functionally equivalent to new ones. Reuse was assumed to double product lifetime of 70% of sourced laptops to six years in total. In EoL, recycled metals were assumed to displace respective primary production. The LCA study shows that reuse of laptops contributed to resource-efficiency in two principal ways: firstly, through the intended use extension (41% reduction compared to new laptops) and secondly, by steering material flows, i.e. laptops that cannot be reused, into recycling. This increased recycling was found especially important according to some LCIA-methods (varying between 1-9% reduction compared to new laptops) which characterise metals that are functionally recycled as important (typically methods using average crustal concentrations as part of their characterisation factors) and negligible in others (typically using reserves as part of their characterisation factors). Some metals have visible contributions in all methods and are unlikely missed if only using one LCIA-method. Other metals are visibly contributing in one or a few methods and thereby risk getting missed in such cases. It is therefore advisable to use complementary methods to minimise risks of overlooking relevant metal resource use aspects when studying circular economy measures for electronics

Resource and environmental impacts of using second-hand laptop computers: A case study of commercial reuse

The circular economy is proposed to reduce environmental impact, but as yet, there is limited empirical evidence of this sort from studying real, commercial circular economy business cases. This study investigates the environmental impacts of using second-hand laptops, mediated by a commercial reuse operation, instead of new ones. The method used is life cycle assessment (LCA) and special attention is given to laptops’ metal resource use by using several complementary life cycle impact assessment methods. The results show that all activities required to enable reuse of laptops are negligible, despite the reuse company’s large geographical scope. Two principal features of reuse reduce environmental impacts. Firstly, use extension reduces all impacts considerably since there are large embedded impacts in components. Secondly, the reuse company steers non-reusable laptops into state-of-the-art recycling. This provides additional impact reductions, especially with regards to toxicity and metal resource use. The results for metal resource use however diverge between LCIA methods in terms of highlighted metals which, in turn, affects the degree of impact reduction. LCIA methods that characterise functionally recycled metals as important, result in larger impact reduction, since these emphasise the merits of steering flows into state-of-the-art recycling. The study thus demonstrates how using second-hand laptops, mediated by a commercial reuse operation, compared to new ones, in practice, reduces different types of environmental impact through synergistic relationships between reuse and recycling. Moreover, it illustrates how the choice of LCIA method can influence interpretations of metal resource use impacts when applying circular economy measures to information and communication technologies (ICT)

How product characteristics can guide measures for resource efficiency - A synthesis of assessment studies

A circular economy aims at decoupling value creation from resource throughput. For circular economy to contribute to environmental and resource improvements, there is need for critical assessments regarding in what general situations, beyond individual cases, solutions may lead to improvements. On the product-level, there is need for synthesized knowledge accounting for a wide range of contexts and environmental impacts. We investigate what resource efficiency (RE) measures result in reduced physical flows and environmental impacts, depending on the characteristics of products and their life cycles. The study is limited to physical measures on a product system level, irrespective of manner of implementation. A library of comparative assessments (primarily life cycle assessments and material flow analyses) was built, covering a wide range of products and RE measures. A framework was formulated for analysing for which product characteristics a measure tends to improve RE, and under which contexts there are trade-offs to take into account. For example, sharing of products is best suited for durable and infrequently used products that tend not to reach their full technical lifetime. A trade-off is that sharing can increase transportation for accessing shared stock. The identified key product characteristics were: whether products are consumable or durable, active or passive, typically used for their full technical lifetimes or discarded before being worn out, the product’s frequency of use and whether function remains at a product’s end of use. Pace of development matters for suitability of measures for active, durable products, while complexity is relevant for restorative measures and recycling

A crustal scarcity indicator for long-term global elemental resource assessment in LCA

Purpose: How to assess impacts of mineral resources is much discussed in life cycle assessment (LCA). We see a need for, and a lack of, a mineral resource impact assessment method that captures the perspective of long-term global scarcity of elements. Method: A midpoint-level mineral resource impact assessment method matching this perspective is proposed, called the crustal scarcity indicator (CSI), with characterization factors called crustal scarcity potentials (CSPs) measured as kg silicon equivalents per kg element. They are based on crustal concentrations, which have been suggested to correlate with several important resource metrics (reserves, reserve base, reserves plus cumulative production, and ore deposits), thereby constituting proxies for long-term global elemental scarcity. Results and discussion: Ready-to-use CSPs are provided for 76 elements, through which the CSI can be calculated by multiplying with the respective masses of elements extracted from Earth’s crust for a certain product. As follows from their crustal concentrations, the three platinum-group metals iridium, osmium, and rhodium have the highest CSPs, whereas silicon, aluminum, and iron have the lowest CSPs. Conclusion: An evaluation of the CSPs and the characterization factors of four other mineral resource impact assessment methods in LCA (the abiotic depletion, the surplus ore, the cumulative exergy demand, and the EPS methods) were conducted. It showed that the CSPs are temporally reliable, calculated in a consistent way, and have a high coverage of elements in comparison. Furthermore, a quantitative comparison with the characterization factors of the four other methods showed that the CSPs reflect long-term global elemental scarcity comparatively well while requiring a minimum of assumptions and input parameters. Recommendations: We recommend using the CSI for assessments of long-term global elemental scarcity in LCA. Since the CSI is at the midpoint level, it can be complemented by other mineral resource impact assessment methods (both existing and to be developed) to provide a more comprehensive view of mineral resource impacts in an LCA