It does seem like there has been progress made/realistic goals in mind. I submitted this Times piece earlier today: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/science/vast-deposits-of-g...

There are contracts for delivery in place: Meanwhile, Tong Ling, China’s largest importer of copper concentrates and one of the world’s largest copper smelters, recently signed a deal with Nautilus for more than a million tons of Pacific sulfide ores per year — an amount equal to about 5 percent of the world’s copper production.