New technologies work with large amounts of minerals. An electric car requires six times more of this raw material than a conventional one.
If you want to replace the fossil fuels, and reduce CO2 emissions, you should invest in more exploitation of minerals to feed the technologies efficient and eco friendly.
So, for example, a electric car you need more than six times the amount of minerals involved in the manufacture of a vehicle that runs on gasoline. Among the most sought-after raw materials are copper, nickel, zinc and graphite.
According to the International Energy Agency, a wind power plant it requires up to nine times more of these raw materials (15,000 kilograms of minerals per megawatt) than one that burns gas.
The same happens with the technology of solar generation, which requires up to 6,500 kilograms of minerals per megawatt.
In this context, energy transition, and even the goal of zero CO2 emissions By 2050, they are not possible without intensive investment in the exploitation and industrialization of the mining.
In Ecuador, although there are only two large-scale mines, the minerals They already move up to 1.5% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), that is, around $ 1,500 million a year.
Those numbers will skyrocket with growing global demand, but social, environmental and indigenous movements demand that they be cut with the fossil fuels and, at the same time, the mining activity.
Through social networks, for example, leaders and activists like Nina Gualinga pointed out that the presidential announcement on the new Galapagos marine reserve it is valuable, but insufficient.
On the one hand, they stressed that, “we need to leave fossil fuels As the Petroleum underground and a just transition to renewable energy and an economy that respects life and the living forest ”. However, they also showed radical opposition to development miner, and even Indigenous and environmental representatives have already filed unconstitutionality claims against Decree 151.
Through this decree, the President of the Republic, Guillermo Lasso, seeks to encourage private investment so that mineral exploitation in the country can take off.
There is no activity with zero impact
Roberto Mendoza, economist and environmental engineer, explained that cutting off the oil source, and at the same time denying any development miner, becomes the perfect formula to generate more poverty and less growth.
“In order for society to grow and develop it needs a reliable and cheap source of energy. The energy transition goes through developing increasingly efficient solutions with the help of minerals “, he said.
According to Mendoza, in the Ecuadorian regulations it is clearly established where it cannot be done mines, and that must be respected. But, in the rest of the spaces the activity cannot be prohibited because it means that the country would lag behind the new economy that is emerging; it would also lose the necessary resources to get out of the crisis.
“Countries like Australia have developed technology to minimize risks. Zero impact cannot be guaranteed. The oldest environmental impact currently it is given by illegal mining, although sometimes you want to put everything in the same bag, “he said.
The price of the minerals It has been going up in recent months. This trend will continue in the face of the energy transition. According to María Eulalia Silva, president of the Chamber of Mining, Ecuador must decide whether to take advantage of the opportunity.
“Metals are vital to transport us, communicate, for medical diagnoses, among others. There is technology to minimize the environmental impact; but if we do not support formal activity, informality will skyrocket because there is good business, “he said. (JS)
Actualmente, los principales minerales de exportación ecuatoriana son oro, plata, cobre y plomo.
A nivel mundial, menos del 5% de la generación de energía es de fuentes renovables
The energy transition is expensive
To meet the goals of zero CO2 emissions by 2050, all world economies have to face a high cost in investments, additional expenses and even an increase in the cost of production and transport.
The journal ‘Nature’ published the estimate that, without a profound technological change, the energy transition would mean an account, only in USA, of more than $ 11,279 per person per year until 2050.
Less ambitious goals are much more affordable. Thus, cutting emissions by 20% would barely have an annual cost of $ 75 per person; and do it at 60%, of $ 1,913 per person).
In countries like Ecuador, the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 22.5% by 2025, as a preliminary step to decarbonize in 2050, could cost more than $ 250 per person per year.
For this reason, work should be done on an international financing mechanism such as blue bonds or compensation trusts to avoid social outbursts.
Those outbursts have been linked to the elimination of the fuel subsidy, despite the fact that, in that case, the real impact on the cost of living is much lower.
