While results confirmed an exceptional amount of copper, Barrick had to revise its cost estimates drastically higher.

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For example, the early 1980s deployment of SX-EW technology hugely increased the amount of copper available to us.

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Costs for coal are highly dependent on the cost of gasoline, and the costs for wind are highly dependent on material costs like steel and concrete as wind requires about 10 times the amount of steel, concrete and copper per kWhr than any other energy source.

FORBES: The Naked Cost of Energy -- Stripping Away Financing and Subsidies

But the surging prices of copper and gold allowed Freeport to retire a large amount of that debt in just its first year as a combined company.

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Buying the necessary copper could prove equally difficult, since analysts estimate global exchange stocks amount to only 140, 000 tonnes, of which the LME holds 65, 000.

ECONOMIST: China's copper crisis | The

We take from nature only that amount that is sustainable: of water, energy, fish, copper, any natural resource.

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