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Comment by xyzzyz | Hacker News Reader

Even better is only 80 years for aluminum, the third most common mineral in Earth's crust, constituting 8% of its weight. What an absurd alarmism.

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Even if we can't get more. It's not like we're using it in a nuclear reaction that turns aluminium into something else. The aluminium is still there.

Not to mention how incredibly recyclable it is. In the US alone aluminum is made from scrap >30% percent of the time [1].

[1]: https://www.usgs.gov/centers/nmic/aluminum-statistics-and-in... (click on an annual PDF).

And after 4 generations, less than 1% of the original material remains.

   percent remaining = 100 * (r^generations))

Where r is expressed as a decimal 0 <= r <=1.

Even at 90% recovery, over 90% of the original material is lost after 22 generations. The highest recycling rate of any material in the US is lead (mostly from auto batteries). The USGS reports that rate as ~70%, though this may be the amount of recycled material in new production.

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