The limits of sustainable metal resources availability

The sustainable availability of raw materials used in manufacturing advanced products is a question that consumers will raise more and more in the future. In order to answer this legitimate request, it is mandatory to define characterization factors capable of taking into account the geological scarcity of an element and also the social and environmental impact of its exploitation and beneficiation. But the specificities of metals also raise the question of their availability from recycling of end-of-life products. It makes no doubt that many products have a dispersive action because of their very low metal contents or because of the complex form under which the metal has been incorporated. The metal availability from recycling will need recycling indices to be developed and specific actions to be taken to fight against improper applications causing harmful resource degradation for the future generations