Copper

The History of Metals

Published

9 years ago

October 8, 2014

Jeff Desjardins

The History of Metals

We have documented the history if individual metals before and we have also visualized their annual production. However, we have not seen all of the metals on one timeline before such as in this infographic.

Worth noting is gold’s prominence ever since the beginning of history. Because the yellow metal is one of the rare elements that can be found in native form (such as nuggets), it was used by the earliest of our ancestors.

Comparatively, it is only recently that the technology has advanced to allow us to discover or extract the rest of the metals on today’s periodic table. For example, even though we knew of titanium as early as 1791, it was relatively useless all the way up until the 1940’s because of its metallurgy. In the 20th century, scientists advanced a way to remove the impurities, making it possible to get the strong and hard titanium we know today.

Another standout fact is that it took all the way until the early 19th century for two very important elements to be discovered. Both are not found free in nature very often and thus slipped detection for many centuries. Silicon, which actually makes up 26% of the earth’s crust, was discovered in 1823. Then in 1827, aluminum was discovered – we now know today that it is the most common metal in the earth’s crust (it’s actually 1200X more abundant than copper).

Original graphic from: Makin Metals

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Base Metals

Ranked: The World’s Largest Copper Producers

Many new technologies critical to the energy transition rely on copper. Here are the world’s largest copper producers.

Published

6 months ago

December 1, 2022

Bruno Venditti

Visualizing the World’s Largest Copper Producers

This was originally posted on Elements. Sign up to the free mailing list to get beautiful visualizations on natural resource megatrends in your email every week.

Man has relied on copper since prehistoric times. It is a major industrial metal with many applications due to its high ductility, malleability, and electrical conductivity.

Many new technologies critical to fighting climate change, like solar panels and wind turbines, rely on the red metal.

But where does the copper we use come from? Using the U.S. Geological Survey’s data, the above infographic lists the world’s largest copper producing countries in 2021.

The Countries Producing the World’s Copper

Many everyday products depend on minerals, including mobile phones, laptops, homes, and automobiles. Incredibly, every American requires 12 pounds of copper each year to maintain their standard of living.

North, South, and Central America dominate copper production, as these regions collectively host 15 of the 20 largest copper mines.

Chile is the top copper producer in the world, with 27% of global copper production. In addition, the country is home to the two largest mines in the world, Escondida and Collahuasi.

Chile is followed by another South American country, Peru, responsible for 10% of global production.

Rank	Country	2021E Copper Production (Million tonnes)	Share
#1	🇨🇱 Chile	5.6	27%
#2	🇵🇪 Peru	2.2	10%
#3	🇨🇳 China	1.8	8%
#4	🇨🇩 DRC	1.8	8%
#5	🇺🇸 United States	1.2	6%
#6	🇦🇺 Australia	0.9	4%
#7	🇷🇺 Russia	0.8	4%
#8	🇿🇲 Zambia	0.8	4%
#9	🇮🇩 Indonesia	0.8	4%
#10	🇲🇽 Mexico	0.7	3%
#11	🇨🇦 Canada	0.6	3%
#12	🇰🇿 Kazakhstan	0.5	2%
#13	🇵🇱 Poland	0.4	2%
	🌍 Other countries	2.8	13%
	🌐 World total	21.0	100%

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and China share third place, with 8% of global production each. Along with being a top producer, China also consumes 54% of the world’s refined copper.

Copper’s Role in the Green Economy

Technologies critical to the energy transition, such as EVs, batteries, solar panels, and wind turbines require much more copper than conventional fossil fuel based counterparts.

For example, copper usage in EVs is up to four times more than in conventional cars. According to the Copper Alliance, renewable energy systems can require up to 12x more copper compared to traditional energy systems.