Use Of Copper In The 19th Century

522 Words3 Pages

The beginning of modern economy is accepted as the Industrial Revolution that occurs in the 18th century, which uses the iron and steam engines as the main driver of the mass production that will shape the world significantly. Although the contribution of copper and its alloys cannot be underestimated, real bounce of copper demand and supply was seen in the beginning of 19th century- the invention of battery. The first true battery is called voltaic pile, which consists of pairs of copper and zinc discs put top of each other, resulted in a production of continuous current. Since electrical wiring system requires a high electrical conductivity and copper is known to be the best conductor among all other non-precious metals, no surprise that …show more content…

World refined copper usage has been increasing since 1900 continuously from less than 500 thousand tons to 22.9 million metric tons in 2014 with an annual rate of 3.4% (ICSG, 2015). Of course the growth rate of increase in consumption slowed down during the years of global crisis. Given the fact that world population is slightly over 7 billion and the current cooper consumption in the world is around 22.9 million tons, the per capita consumption of copper is approximately 3,27 kg making it world’s third most important metal (in terms of weight) after iron and aluminum respectively. On the production side, the leader country for mine production is Chile with almost one-third of the world production whereas for the refined production it is China with again approximately one-third of the world production (ICSG, 2015). As the share of production and economic growth of Asian countries has been increasing, their copper needs also increase due to the rise in production of industrial equipment manufacture together with rise of building construction. However not all Asian countries are in the same level of economic development that is why I will examine later how the consumption of copper differs, as I look different countries. While it will be detailed in another part of this paper, effects of copper imports and exports on economic growths and its contribution to developing countries should be borne in