conservation policies and copper in the uk

In recent years, there have been

several calls for a UK government

policy towards materials. This

paper takes some proposals

regarding conservation, end applies

them to the UK copper-using

industries. The main conclusions

are that consumption is likely to

decline anyway over the next ten

years, but government attempts to

influence the trend are likely to

have little real effect - or else will

be very costly, in money and other

terms.

The author is with the Science Policy

Research Unit, University of Sussex,

Falmer, Brighton BNl 9RF. Sussex,

UK.

This study was supported by the Social Science Research Council, London, and the author is very grateful to Carlos Fortin (Sussex) and to officials of IMI Ltd. Delta Metal Company, and BICC Ltd. for their assistance and cooperation.

Conservation policies and copper in the UK

William Page

The ways in which the UK obtains and uses copper raise issues which, to some extent, may have a bearing on the well-being of the nation as a whole, and are consequently of some public interest. Certainly, a number of reports have mentioned copper as a metal meriting more policy consideration than it currently receives from government. The aim of this study is to examine the extent to which some aspects of a ‘national materials policy’ make sense when applied to the realities of the copper-using industries in the UK. The emphasis is on demand for copper, rather than supply.

This paper is partly a response to the existing calls for a national materials policy. Equally, it is presented in anticipation of the possibility that, sometime over the next decade, there may be another boom in the world economy and in materials prices; and that this could lead to increasing calls for government action aimed at, among other things, helping industry to obtain adequate supplies at reasonable prices, and to move away from the more expensive and/or less secure materials (such as copper); and that this, in turn, could lead to some hasty and ill-conceived measures being taken, with undesired longer-term consequences. Of course, such a chain of events may not occur, but they are still sufficiently plausible to make it sensible to examine the issues in the relative tranquility of the present.

Why propose a policy?

To propose a national policy of some kind regarding materials, and especially copper, is to imply that the way the affairs of the copper- using industries are currently handled is not the best one from the point of view of what is vaguely called the national interest. The balance of payments is an example of an issue which is not of immediate and direct importance to industry - private, public or state-owned - but which is certainly important to the nation as a whole (and thus indirectly to industry). In 1977, the gross import bill for copper, from ore to worked metal, was f4 12 million, or 1.1% of the total UK visible import bill. Given the adverse effects of running a balance of payments deficit, there might be arguments for encouraging industry to use less copper than it would do otherwise. Again, there might be grounds for promoting other materials over copper when more of the processing of the others is undertaken in the UK, thus helping to create marginally more jobs. There may even be

206 0301-4207/80/030206-17 $02.00 0 1980 IPC Business Press


’ These quotes come from the Report of a NATO Science Committee Study Group, The Rational Use of Potentially Scarce Metals. NATO Scientific Affairs Division, Brussels, 1976; that is, except for number 6, which comes from the Report of the Research Committee Working Party on Materials and Energy Resources, Materials and Energy Resources, Institution of Chemical Engineers, Rugby, UK, 1976. Other significant publications advocating (to varying extents) some form of materials policy include: Sir Alan Cottrell, ‘The age of scarcity’ (Eleventh Sir Julius Wernher Memorial Lecture), Transactions/Section A of the Institution of Mining and Metallurgy, Vol 83, 1974, pp 25-30: and his ‘Making the most of things’ (Bruce Preller Lecture), 1978 Yearbook, Royal Society of Edinburgh; and Professor Jack Nutting, ‘Metals as materials’ (Presidential Address to The Metals Society), Metals and Materials. July/August 1977. ’ T.B. Marsden and A.V. Hall, ‘The market for rolled copper-based products’, Metals Technology, March 1975, p 101.

Regardless of the rights and wrongs of a general government policy towards materials, or specifically copper, several suggestions for action have been made in recent years. A common theme, although one far from universal, is that action be taken to reduce consumption, through substitution of expensive or potentially scarce materials (such as copper, some might say) by others that are less so, and through increased recycling or economy in use. Such proposals include:’

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‘A tax on waste disposal’; ‘A ban on non-returnable goods (such as cans, batteries and cars)‘; ‘A tax on virgin materials’; ‘Direct incentives (such as tax allowances, accelerated depreciation allowances, price support and low-interest loans)‘; ‘Codes to ensure longer product life, and . . . easier reclamation and recycling’; ‘A vigorous campaign by government, The Metals Society, the professional institutions, and other bodies, to promote greater economy of use of all our resources - Department of Industry Requirements Boards and the Science Research Council should make funds available for R&D programmes in this field’; ‘It seems essential to educate a new generation of designers and engineers, informed about materials problems and about the technology of substitution and recycling, who would oversee the transition to a new sort of design philosophy in which materials conservation plays a leading role’.

circumstances under which the copper-using industries themselves might seek government support in, for instance, establishing a national stockpile of copper, or by providing guarantees on foreign mining investments; under some conditions, reduced demand could ease longer-term supply problems. And there may well be some people who would still argue that the world is running out of copper, and that something needs to be done to save us before it is too late.

Similar suggestions have been made elsewhere and, of course, further suggestions also exist, a key one being the establishment of some kind of expert advisory board. Also, fairness requires it to be noted that the advocates of such proposals see a need for further study, and admit that conflicts exist between various goals.

UK copper consumption without a formal policy

In 1973, around 269 900 tonnes of the 541 200 tonnes of copper consumed in the UK went into electrical conductors of various kinds. However, aluminium had made inroads into this market, displacing something like 100 000 tonnes of copper. Thus the consumption of copper for electrical purposes was around 35-40% less than it would have been, had aluminium been kept out of the market (and total UK copper consumption, about 18% less). As an instance of improved economy of use, rather than substitution, we can take the wire used by the Post Office in its local distribution networks (for the cabinet-subscriber link); 20 lb of copper were used per mile of such wire in the 193Os, as against 4 lb typical now. A typical 1500~~ car made in the UK in 1964 contained around 5 kg of copper and brass in its radiator; this had dropped to around 4 kg by 1972.2

How is the UK consumption of copper likely to evolve in the future

RESOURCES POLICY September 1980 207


/- - \ 650- // \

CU

8 s 350 9 w

% 30

f -.\ +--__ _----__

250 _._-** Zn --.___. _t-_

-..-* . -FM-- ---\y_.___:;$

‘.“/ 200

Figure 1. UK consumption of copper,

aluminium, zinc and lead, 1962-78.

Source: Metallgesellschaft AG, Statistics, Frankfurt-am-Main, years.

208

Metal 01 ” ” ” ” ” ” ” ” I various 1962 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 76

Year

if no concerted actions are taken by government (or other public or professional bodies) to reduce it? Something like 500 000 tonnes/year are used at present, making the UK the fifth largest market in the world (and, after Japan and West Germany, the third largest importer). The value of this copper is in the region of X300-500 million/year, taking its value as unworked metal.

Figure 1 shows how the UK consumption of refined metal moved between 1962 and 1977, and gives the comparable figures for aluminium, lead and zinc. There has been no trend in the consumption of copper that stands out sharply; there was a peak in 1965, and lesser peaks in 1968 and 1973, and the effect of the recession of the mid-1970s is apparent. The general economic conditions that helped to create these peaks and troughs have also influenced the other three metals in similar ways, although the absolute year-to-year changes for lead and zinc have generally been less. Aluminium, which is an actual or potential competitor to copper in many applications, has been on an upward trend, and it is arguable that the two metals are on divergent paths.

It is dangerous to read long-term trends into information like this, especially given that the trend is clearly dependent to quite a large extent on the general level of national economic activity. With this caveat, it can be pointed out that the statistical trend line in the UK consumption of refined copper from 1962 to 1977 represents a decline of around 7 700 tonnes/year. Extrapolating ahead on the basis of this trend, the 1990 figure will be 25% below the actual for 1977; it must be emphasized that this is not a forecast, but simply a crude extrapolation. But, to the extent that it can be taken to suggest anything, it suggests that UK consumption is likely to continue declining over the long-term.

This picture contrasts interestingly with that to be found in most other industrialized countries. In 1950, the UK market for copper was the second largest in the world, coming after the USA; by 1960, the USSR had put the UK into third place and, by 1970, Japan and West Germany had put it into fifth place (where it still is). Although the market in these countries has grown rapidly, the UK has been notable

RESOURCES POLICY September 1980


Figure 2. UK production of some

types of copper semi-manufactures,

1962-78 (gross weight). 1 I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I 1962 63 64 65 66 67 60 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78

Source: As Figure 1. Year

Alloyed sheets,

for its lack of growth: of 2 1 major countries, 15 had higher growth rates in copper consumption between 1950 and 1960 and, from 1960 to 1970, it was only the UK and Sweden that had actual declines in consumption. Again, the UK market size was unusual between 1970 and 1977, in that it declined once more.3

Overview of UK end-uses

The uses of copper can be looked at at two points: the semi- manufactured, and the final product. Figure 2 shows movements in the production of seven categories of semis from 1962 to 1978. The market is dominated by unalloyed wire (mainly for electrical conductors) and alloyed rods, bars and sections (mainly brass, with a variety of uses); between them, they typically account for just over half of the total gross weight covered in this figure. Thus, the market for these specific products merits attention when looking ahead.

The movements of the seven categories of semis over time are remarkably parallel to one another; none is growing or declining significantly in comparison with the others. They all mirror to similar degrees the overall fortunes of the copper market in the UK, and thus of UK economic activity. This consistency over the past 16 years is one reason for not initially expecting any great changes in the relative importance of these markets over the next five to ten years, in that any large change would be a break with recent history.

Table 1 gives a breakdown of UK copper consumption into five main end-use categories for 1965, 1970 and 1975. The dominant application is the conducting of electricity; copper’s conductivity is exceeded only by silver’s (for most practical purposes), and electrical applications take over 40% of the copper market. Another 20% or so is used in construction, and especially for plumbing applications. General engineering is taking a further 20% or so, and the remainder is split between transport (which includes vehicle radiators) and

3 Calculated from Metallgesellschaft AG, general domestic goods (including appliances).

Metal Statistics, Frankfurt-am-Main, Reading a long-term trend in this table is dangerous because the various years. period covered is short. However, there has been a decline in the



Table 1. UK end-uses of copper, 1965, 1970 and 1975.

1965 1970 1975 (“/.I (%I (%I

Electrical 53 42 42 Source: Copper Development Construction 19 17 22 Association. Transport 11 11 9

General engineering 13 20 20 Nofe: The 1 000 companies used in this Domestic goods and miscellaneous 4 10 7 ranking are those with the 1 000 largest turnovers (ie f22 million or over).

Total tonnage (lo3 tonnes) 601.2 499.9

qEnd-use figures from the Copper Development Association, but divided by total figures from Metallgesellscaft so as to provide consistency with other totals given in this paper. The author is slightly embarrassed at presenting figures which are so out-of-date, but he has been unable to locate more recent, quotable statistics at this level of detail. 5 The Engineer, 12 April 1979, p 13. 0

proportion of electrical uses, and an increase in general engineering, domestic goods and miscellaneous.

The categories employed in this analysis so far have been broad, and probably too broad to permit a sensible discussion of the prospects for conservation. Unfortunately, more detailed information is not publicly available for most years, although qualitative information combined with some of the available numbers points to four uses that consume much copper and which also offer a significant potential for conservation. These are electrical, telecommunications cabling, plumbing and heat exchangers. Most examples to be cited below are taken from these key applications.

No attempt is made in this paper to forecast future demand levels for copper in the UK, but the picture of a mildly declining market (over the long-term) needs a major caveat. Depending on (among many other things) future copper price levels, there is the possibility of a major shift away from copper over the next five to ten years, even if the government did nothing further to encourage it. More will be said below on the circumstances that will influence the extent of any shift away from copper, but here we can draw attention to some of the possibilities that point to this general conclusion. They include:

0 Heavy power cables: around half this market has moved to aluminium (the so-called Group 1 customers - mainly area electricity boards), but the other half is still largely with copper. Parts of the cable industry argue that this is because the cost difference between a copper and aluminium cable, once installed, is not great, and this market prefers to play it safe by staying with the traditional copper. This conservatism, goes the argument, is not generally justified, and copper could lose much of this market over the next five to ten years (in 1968, insulated power cables, as a whole, accounted for 6.9% of UK copper consumption; and for 5.4% in 1973).4 Aluminium has displaced much of the copper used in telecommunications cable, and there is a major challenge to much of the remaining copper cable looming up in the form of fibre optical systems which are already in use on experimental bases, and the UK Post Office is investing about &5 million on around 280 miles of fibre optic links, so as to gain experience with this technology5 (in 1968, telecommunications cables were 8.0% of the UK copper market, very close to the 1973 figure). In assessing this market, it should be noted that many Post Office engineers are not exactly enthusiastic about aluminium, and some movement back to copper over the next ten years cannot be totally excluded. Given the right conditions and satisfactory conclusions to further

210 RESOURCES POLICY September 1980


technical research, the amount of copper used in new wiring in domestic and commercial premises could be greatly reduced (12.8% of the 1968 market, 16.2% of the 1973 market).

0 At present, copper is the only significant conductor used in electric motor, generator or transformer windings in the UK, although aluminium was first tried in such windings in 1918 (in two German transformers6), and was widely used during the second world war in Germany, Italy, Austria and Belgium. During the early 197Os, aluminium started to be used in the windings of many US-made electric motors, and the Swedish company, ASEA, now uses aluminium windings in many of its products.’ There is no reason to believe that, given time and the right conditions (such as a very high, long-lasting copper price), the UK industry would not also move towards a much greater use of aluminium (covered winding wires: 11.5% in 1968, 10.3% in 1973).

0 Copper (with its alloys) is the traditional material for use in vehicle radiators. However, around 20% of European cars have switched to alternatives (including aluminium, plastics and steels). Although these alternatives present some problems and limitations, and the copper-based product is subject to continuous improvement, it is far from impossible that copper could lose more of this market over the coming decade. And one way that copper is fighting back is through thinning, so that less is used even in a copper-based radiator (1% in 1968, but 6% of the alloy market).

0 Many plumbing pipes and fittings (eg taps) are traditionally made from copper or its alloys in the UK, although plastics have made serious inroads on the waste side and in part of the tap market. Plastics are permitted in some other countries for applications otherwise accounting for a large tonnage of copper, and it is likely that they may become acceptable, and then widely used, in the UK over the next ten years. Some suppliers of copper piping are actively investigating the merits of offering a plastic alternative. One company (Autocan Manufacturing) has been selling do-it-yourself micro-bore central heating systems with nylon pipe in the UK since 1968; they offer a 25 year guarantee on this pipe, suggesting a high degree of confidence in it. Thinning is also affecting this market: the trend is towards less copper per unit of pipe or per tap, for instance (tubing for such purposes was 8.2% of the market in 1968, and 15% of the alloy semis market went to plumbers’ fittings and brassware).

0 To show that markets can have the potential to grow as well as decline, it is worth noting that there is a growing market for ornaments, many of which use copper and its alloys; this market was apparently worth about %70 million/year around 1978, and is growing at about 5% a year; it has a significant export potential. Solar heating and agricultural chemicals are two other applications that, although unlikely to ever be large in the UK, still offer growth possibilities.

6 H.F. Green, ‘Aluminium in the electrical industrv’. Electronics and Power. 1

Individual products and the pros and cons of conservation November 1973. p 473. 7 Information obtained from ASEA, In practice, it is not easy to evaluate the pros and cons of Sweden. conservation at the national level, although statistics are available to



help on such matters as the tonnage and value of copper imports and exports, and a general feel can be obtained for where copper is used. What is perhaps even harder is to build up a national picture by aggregating the pros and cons at the levels where decisions to use copper, and how to use it, are actually made; at the levels of the designers, the production engineers, the approval and specification authorities, and so on.

Before a step towards conservation can be sensibly recommended at the company level, let alone at the national level, several questions need satisfactory answers. These questions can be put into two categories: those concerned with the costs (monetary or otherwise) of the conservation; and (especially if we are concerned with national policy) those concerned with the best mechanisms for bringing about the change.

A very simple and naive model of how decisions to use copper are made would say that it is used when it offers the best value for money, taking into account its price, costs of the tooling needed, manufacturing costs, and so on; if another way of manufacturing the product would lead to a lower final cost, with or without copper, then it will be used instead. On this basis, any change that would benefit copper users would have been implemented already (or, at least, would be under way). Thus, imposing a change that would not otherwise occur must represent a loss to the copper user (although, of course, he could theoretically be compensated by government). If we assume that a change would only be imposed if it were in the interests of the nation as a whole, we must then be prepared to make the trade- off between the public benefits and those losses that the theory says the copper users would incur.

Because this model assumes perfect competition between rival materials and production processes, it is clearly detached from the real world. The question is, how detached? In particular, are copper users in the UK sufficiently well informed and imaginative that any steps towards conservation that would benefit them have already been taken, or are under way? Are the problems that are presented below concerning the obstacles to further conservation, and which have emerged partly from briefly surveying UK copper users, to be taken as a true reflection of the real position? Or do they reflect a talent for finding problems and thus for missing opportunities?

The present paper could speculate on the answer (although it does not). What it cannot do is to point to a body of literature, studies and hard evidence on how decisions concerning the use of materials are made in practice. This would seem to be a significant gap in knowledge, a gap that needs some filling if materials and conservation policies are to be debated sensibly.

We now turn to the obstacles, real or otherwise, to increased conservation. It should be emphasized that what is of interest (in this context) is why further conservation may not proceed rapidly; the many cases where copper has been conserved are of interest only to the extent that they show how and when it can be done successfully (which, of course, is a very important extent).

Costs of conservation

Production costs

How do the costs of producing a new copper-conserving product



compare with those of its predecessors? It is clear that, in many cases, conservation can lead to reduced costs for products; this is one reason why the substitution of copper by aluminium has occurred for some of the larger power cables, and why there has been increased thinning of copper (or its alloys) in some tubing and other plumbing fittings, and why both substitution and thinning has occurred in car radiators.

This cost aspect will be examined in more detail when looking at fiscal incentives to conservation, but attention should be drawn to a conceptual point here: conserving copper can mean using more of other resources. For an aluminium cable to have the same rating as a copper one, it must be thicker; consequently, it needs more insulation material (if it is to be insulated) - in theory, 20-30% more, and in practice, perhaps yet more still, so as to reach the next convenient cross-sectional size. If it is an aluminium motor winding, it will be bulkier and so the motor as a whole will be larger and need more materials. Although this is certainly not always the case, these two examples show that it can be dangerous to assume that conserving one material input will reduce total material inputs. Although obvious, this point can get lost if there is an obsession with materials conservation (eg, induced by the particular brief given to a committee, or by high prices).

Installation costs (when relevant) Is the copper-conserving product as cheap to install as its predecessor? It is more than likely that, had aluminium car radiators been as easy to install in cars (on an assembly line) as the copper- based radiators, they might have started to make serious inroads many years ago; as it is, aluminium is not as amenable to assembly line jointing techniques as are copper and its alloys.

The present study has succeeded in obtaining little hard information on this general point, although a number of opinions have been proffered, especially regarding substitutes in electrical and plumbing applications; the real problem is the lack of recent field trials. In theory, plastic piping might be marginally easier to install than the traditional copper product; on the other hand, the industry is quick to point out that not all plumbers use exactly the tools, components and methods that would be recommended, and consequently there can be a gap between theory and practice (this raises the whole question of training and its organization, although it will not be pursued here). Again, the experience of aluminium domestic wiring in the UK in recent years was unfavourable, in that (among other things) regular house calls often had to be made to check on the safety of the wiring (as discussed below). While this addition to the costs makes it unlikely that that particular experiment will be repeated, it tells us nothing about the relative costs of installing a satisfactory aluminium-based wire, once successfully established.

In other words this study can point to the need to compare costs of installation, but can shed little light on the hard details.

Product quality Is the copper-conserving product of adequate quality? ‘Quality’ is a multifaceted concept, covering ability to do the job, durability, safety, appearance and so on. There certainly have been cases where substitutes have finally had to be replaced by the traditional copper



8 information from Runcom Development Corporation, UK. 9 If one takes an annual average price for 99.5% pure aluminium ingots and for LME electrolytic copper wirebars (which will admittedly be a very crude measure of the prices actually paid by conductor manufacturers), one finds that a given sum of money would have bought more aluminium than copper in every year since 1950. In 18 of these years, it would have been more than 50% extra aluminium and, in nine of them, over twice as much.

214

product; aluminium wiring in some houses in Runcorn,’ and stainless steel piping used in some central heating installations by Gas Boards, are two cases in point.

Because they account for around 40% of the UK copper market, electrical conductors are an important example. Aluminium has 61% of copper’s conductivity on a volume-for-volume basis but (as it is so much lighter) almost exactly double the conductivity per tonne. Thus, when space is at a premium, aluminium is technically inferior. On the other hand, aluminium is cheaper, and thus is commercially interesting.9 Indeed, there is no great problem in producing aluminium cables and wires of all types; several aspects of the plant and process are virtually identical to that used for copper, and when they are not (eg if continuous casting comes into the process), then it is still standard ‘off the shelf technology that is involved. Indeed, around half the high rating cables are aluminium, as mentioned above. The barriers to the wider use of aluminium wires stem partly from what can be called problems of quality. For instance, an aluminium flex (from an appliance to a plug) does not take kindly to the amount of flexing it may well receive in use; it may finally break and be dangerous.

More important in wiring is the risk of fire. Aluminium is a good conductor, but aluminium oxide is not. Unfortunately, an oxide layer is formed the instant that the metal is exposed to air; while this is not a serious problem in a newly made connection, minor sparks can lead to a deterioration of the aluminium and the build-up of a thicker insulating layer which, with time, can allegedly lead to the kind of sparks that set houses, public buildings, and so on, on fire. The problem is exacerbated by the so-called creep properties of aluminium, as a result of which the conductor is pulled into a new shape over time.

There are technical solutions to this, and in the hands of professional electricians using the right equipment and methods, safety is not a problem. What is a problem is ensuring that every connection in the country will be properly made. While accessories made for aluminium can be quite safe when used for copper, the reverse is not always true; and were there to be a change-over, it would be many decades before it became hard, let alone impossible, for do-it-yourself electricians to connect aluminium to accessories designed only for copper. It is not easy to see legislation preventing the use of the wrong accessories; how, in practice, am I to be stopped from taking a plug off an old lamp (with copper flex) and putting it onto a new one (with an aluminium flex)? Careful labelling, advertising and publicity (conducted by retailers and insurance companies among others) might help, but are far from guaranteeing that the correct procedures will be followed.

It is these social aspects that take the problem back to being a technical one: if copper is to be displaced in much of the wiring market, then the alternative wire must be compatible with the existing range of accessories. Aluminium clad with another metal (copper itself, or perhaps nickel) is the obvious solution, but the technology for producing such bi-metal conductors at prices comparable with copper is not currently available. Not available, that is, taking into account the very low copper price of the past few years, although copper-clad aluminium has been used by, for instance, Genera1 Motors for car battery cables. One estimate is that the copper price



would have to go to f2 OOO/tonne - about double what it is now, but a price which is not out of the question (for a short period, at least) - before this substitution became generally viable.

There is a very important caveat to this conclusion, left to the end because of its controversial nature: is aluminium wire all that dangerous? The dominant view in many countries is that it is indeed dangerous, but this is disputed by authorities in some Eastern European countries and in India; indeed, aluminium was used extensively in many properties in the UK in the late 1940s and there is no reason to believe that it has all been pulled out;‘O the author has been unable to find evidence that this wiring has caused any fires in the UK” - although that does not prove there is no potential danger. One conclusion that can be drawn is that the evidence against aluminium may be more controversial than is generally portrayed by at least parts of the industry. For instance, Runcorn has had a bad experience with aluminium in houses, while there have been no problems in parts of Manchester. Among other differences between these two cases we can cite different cable manufacturers and different installers. Comparisons with other countries sometimes need careful handling; for instance, the bad experience of parts of the USA in using aluminium cannot be transferred naively to the UK, because the USA operates on double the current (ie around half the voltage). Again, Hungary appears to have relatively strict and enforced rules on how wiring is to be done, and there may well be differences in both attitudes towards obeying such rules and in how much old (copper- based) wiring was in existence when aluminium started to be used.

Electrical wiring is not the only area where quality problems can arise. Car radiators made without copper have produced problems in hot climates; in the UK, it is still controversial to claim that plastics are technically acceptable for many hot water applications. There are also cases of technical evaluations of materials proving wrong, even if they have been widely accepted (PVC, now the standard cable insulator, was initially regarded as quite unsuitable for that application). Many people would argue that some of the present technical evaluations of copper-conserving products are too conservative (eg those concerning plastics in plumbing). Indeed, one source has suggested that a good reason for not using one specific type of nylon piping in central heating systems is nothing to do with its technical or cost aspects, but that any future purchaser of the property with that system might be suspicious (even if a building society accepted it). ‘*

It is important to point out that copper-conserving products can often offer qualities that are superior to the traditional product. Optical fibres are being experimented with to replace metal cable in telecommunications and other information-carrying applications; they are easier to protect against mechanical damage, do not generate sparks if broken (relevant in, for instance, oil refineries or coal mines), do not suffer from interference from nearby electrical conductors (especially relevant to railway telecommunications equipment alongside electrified lines, for instance) and, being of low scrap value and of little use for most other purposes, are less likely to be ‘nicked’.i3

‘OThe author has spoken to electricians who say that there still is aluminium wiring to be found in some properties. “This is despite an informal enquiry to the Fire Research Establishment. ‘2Do-/t-Yourself magazine, UK, (personal enquiry). l3 The Engineer, 4 August 1977, p 18.

Other costs and drawbacks There are, of course, other disadvantages that can arise from


Comervalion policies and copper in the UK

producing and using copper-conserving products. For instance, cable manufacturers had problems in obtaining adequate quantities of insulating plastics during 1973-74, and so it is disadvantageous to aluminium that it requires a larger quantity of such plastics (given the increased diameter needed for comparable conductivity). As traditional and new products must coexist for a time, those concerned with stocking spare parts, accessories and the like (eg builders’ merchants, car radiator repair establishments, etc) have a much larger range of items to stock and finance.

Means of furthering conservation

An earlier section suggested that, under some quite plausible circumstances, the UK consumption of copper might decline significantly as a result of actions taken by the industry itself. This section asks how outside pressures (originating mainly from government) could speed up that process, were a speeding-up thought desirable.

Fiscal measures Fiscal measures have been proposed; they include tax or similar penalties on the use of some materials, and subsidies of various sorts on preferred materials. Copper would presumably come into the former category. The question is, how sensitive is the medium- and long-term demand for copper to its price? This is a very difficult question to answer, but the demand for copper over the short term (a year or two) is generally insensitive to the price; indeed, high demand is a reason for high prices (between 1972 and 1974, world consumption of refined copper increased by 4.6%, but the average London Metal Exchange price in 1974 was double that of 1972 - f878/tonne as against .f428). Consequently, a tax on copper cannot be expected to make a great difference to consumption in the short term; those who believe otherwise must show why previous price increases have not reduced demand (actually, a tax might reduce UK copper consumption, by making UK copper-containing goods less attractive in export markets - not a desirable consequence; refunding the tax on exported copper would be a very messy procedure, unlikely to appeal to government).

The sensitivity of demand to price over a longer period is not easy to establish from price and consumption statistics; indeed, it is probably impossible to calculate a sensible price elasticity of demand on that basis. Such an estimate could only come from building up a picture based on examining individual groups of products, but even this approach is based on several assumptions. An estimate was reported earlier that copper would have to be at &2 OOO/tonne (in 1978 & or 1979 &) before its substitution in wiring by aluminium would become commercially interesting; but what if the aluminium price moved in an unanticipated way? What if copper hit &2 200/tonne, but adequate supplies of suitable aluminium were hard to obtain (a problem faced by some aluminium users in the past)? And what assumptions are being made about the production costs of a satisfactory aluminium (pure or copper-clad) cable?

In principle, it is clearly possible to take individual copper- containing products (or groups of them), and to estimate the costs of reducing or eliminating the copper content; this information, in turn,



would lead to conclusions about the copper price that would make conservation commercially interesting in each case. In some cases, a reliable estimate would be possible; in others, a range based on various assumptions and guesses is all that is possible. However, such an exercise would require much expertise and time, and would be dependent on great cooperation from the industry itself; it was certainly beyond the scope of the present study, and of what could be reasonably asked for from the copper-using companies.

Consequently, there is much work to be done before it would be possible to decide on the exact fiscal arrangements that would influence copper conservation. And this ignores many other problems, including those of the effects of higher costs on UK exports (and how to handle any rebate scheme for exporters).

But the conceptual point remains: given the great variation in the copper price anyway, from year to year, is pushing the curve upwards by a few per cent or a few pounds likely to have much effect? Finally, there are the practicalities of such proposals; on the one hand, penalizing those users who have little commercial option but to stay with copper is victimization rather than conservation but, on the other hand, discriminating between ‘essential’ and ‘non-essential’ users is far from straightforward. Other and similar practical problems would arise in any attempt to subsidize competing materials. There is also the point, discussed below, that three companies dominate the use of copper in the UK; what are their responses likely to be?

Legislation Legislation is sometimes proposed as another means to conservation, and it is useful to make a broad distinction between three types of legislation: prohibiting (eg proposals that certain uses of some materials be banned); enabling (eg legislation that permits local authorities to engage in some recycling activities); and requiring (eg legislation that would require specific products to have a stated minimum average functional life). It is difficult to find much legislation in the UK which was introduced with materials conservation as the main objective (except during wartime), although steps towards some forms of conservation have arisen from limiting the emissions of heavy metals, or establishing the Anti-waste Campaign.

In the context of conservation, prohibiting or requiring legislation could certainly achieve some specific goals, if suitably drafted and enforced. For instance, a ban on the use of copper or its alloys in new ornaments (candlesticks, etc), or a requirement that all copper- containing products be recycled (presumably with the exclusion of some specific products, such as agricultural chemicals) would certainly help to conserve copper. But at least two practical problems emerge again, assuming that such legislation ever approached being on the books. First, there is the problem of loopholes. Second, there is the problem of the costs of conservation; many of the problems outlined above would be handled by brute force, possibly leading to all the deleterious consequences outlined. There is also the problem of deciding which products should be controlled and which to leave relatively free.

Because of its crude nature and potentially damaging consequences, it is very hard to see prohibiting legislation playing a major role in changing the way copper is used in the UK, although



Table 2. The three largest copper-using firms in the UK: their rankings in ‘The Times 1000’ (1977 figures).

Capital Net profit as % of: No of Turnover employed turnover capital employees Exports

BICC 34 52 586 710 30 16 Delta Metal 93 78 453 726 55 58 IMI 94 77 354 537 74 47

there may be minor but significant roles for enabling and requiring legislation.

The central point that has been left out so far is the role of that quasi-legislative body of rules embodied in British Standards, building codes, etc. It is these that formally inhibited, if not prevented, the use of aluminium in wiring and plastics in hot water systems; if conservation of copper is to be encouraged, this present body of rules and regulations must be made more positive. Without prejudice to how right or wrong these specifications and regulations may be, we can point to them as central to any attempt at reducing copper consumption.

Industrial structure When discussing the UK consumption of copper, it is easy to assume that there is a host of users towards whom policies or actions must be directed. While this may be true in some senses, it is important to remember that copper consumption is dominated by three companies: BICC (formerly, British Insulated Callender’s Cables); IMI (formerly Imperial Metals Industries, once a subsidiary of ICI); and the Delta Metal Group. No policy on copper will make much sense unless it is implemented by them and their subsidiaries or associated companies.

The present author is in no position to present their views, especially given, first, that this study is not based on an exhaustive survey; second, there is a great diversity of views; and, third, that what people say does not always bear a one-to-one relationship to what they do (regardless of who they may be or where they work). But at least four points are worth making.

One is that no significant moves towards further conservation of copper are going to succeed without the active involvement of these three groups of companies. Second, these three companies are important at the level of the national economy; taking The Times list of 1 000 top companies, ranked by turnover in 1977, BICC was number 34, Delta was 93 and IMI was 94. As exporters, they do well; they rank 16, 58 and 47 respectively; and in terms of their numbers of employees, they rank 30, 55 and 74 (see Table 2). Thus, any adverse implications on these companies of a copper policy cannot be lightly dismissed.

Many different ways exist for assessing the performance and health of a company, and it should also be pointed out that these three companies are involved in many activities that do not use copper, or only use it as a small part of the activity. This said, attention can be drawn to indicators that suggest these companies are not in a good position to take any blows that a materials-conserving policy might deliver them. Ranked according to profits, before tax or interest, as a percentage of turnover, they come 586,453 and 354 respectively; and as a percentage of capital employed, 710, 726 and 537. In themselves,



these indicators prove little, but they certainly suggest a need to proceed cautiously in imposing new burdens on them (even if there was a view that the conservation policy would ultimately be a boon to them, and not a burden).

Lastly, these firms do not appear to be embarrassed by admitting that they have a conservative attitude towards conservation. They acknowledge that they have seen new ways of conserving copper come unstuck enough times to make them cautious although, of course, innovations do continue to arise and are followed through. What this means is that one is not dealing with an industry which is generally bursting with enthusiasm to try out conserving processes and products, and it is possible that they could be encouraged to proceed faster than they might otherwise, if government found the desire to push them.

Other approaches If there is limited practical scope for acceleration the move towards conservation through harsh fiscal or legislative means (as argued), three other approaches remain: persuasion, inducement and assistance.

Persuasion. In this context, persuasion means developing and prop- agating arguments to show copper users why it is in their own interest to conserve copper. At one extreme, this could be by showing them how conservation can cut costs (if and when that could be true, but they do not realize it); to be effective, such an approach could only be employed if some of the other barriers to change were removed, and properly so. There is no point in telling firms how profitable aluminium wire would be when, first, they know this anyway and, second, it is not they who are preventing its use. At the other extreme are the ‘good citizen’ modes of argument, which are unlikely to carry much weight if the other forces operate in opposing directions.

Inducements. This is the term intended to catch those incentives that firms may take or leave; preferential treatment on government or local authority contracts are a prime exemplar. Although we have no quantitative estimates, a significant percentage of the copper used in the UK ends up being bought by national or local government, or by nationalized industries. But again, it is much easier to propose such a scheme as preferential treatment, than it is to implement it.

Assistance. This probably comes down to paying the bill for some research, development, consultancy and information services, but with the point that some of these activities might not be initiated otherwise. There is certainly evidence that, under some conditions, the provision of these services can result in changes in industrial practices. For instance, the services provided by the Energy Technology Support Unit (ETSU) of Harwell, with support from the Department of Energy, certainly appear to be helping reduce industrial demand for energy. The Electronic Components Sector Working Party of the National Economic Development Council has suggested that about &35 million of government money go into the UK fibre optics and optoelectronics industries; although the conservation of copper is certainly not the main objective of this recommendation, it would definitely be a side-effect.


Cotlservarion policies and copper in the UK

I4 J.H. Westbrook, ‘Materials information _ an examination of the adequacy of existing systems’, in F.P. Huddle ted), Requirements For Fulfilling a National Materials Policy, Office of Technology Assessment, US Congress, Washington, DC. 1974. p 38.

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Research and information However, before proposing government-supported conservation schemes along these lines, it is necessary to establish clearly whether the industry itself is already doing enough and, if not, why not; in many cases, industry is already doing, or has done, extensive research into products that would conserve copper. For instance, the producers of wire and cable, and related accessories, have looked at substitutes in great detail, including some test marketing; fibre optics are receiving much attention, and have also been given field tests; the vehicle radiator market is very aware of designs that, amongst other things, conserve copper. In such cases, providing forms of technical assistance is not necessarily going to make much difference. And when industry is not doing enough, the reasons may be of a type that will not be overcome simply by providing technical information services.

It should also be emphasised that, in many cases, the problem is not that of generating new information, but of disseminating that which already exists. Although the only study on this specific question known to the present author was conducted in the USA, it may still be pertinent to the UK. People engaged in the materials sector (in industry, government and universities) were asked to identify their chief sources of information; the 668 respondents cited 574 unique sources. l4 Thus, rationalization of information sources might be as important, if not more so, as paying for the collection of yet more technical data. This general area certainly merits more attention, despite our provisos.

Conclusions

Over the past 15 years (at least), there has been a slightly downward trend in the UK’s consumption of copper. Looking at the main end- uses of the metal, it is apparent that there is the potential for further declines over the next five to ten years and, under some (perhaps unlikely) circumstances, something like a 50% reduction in a decade or two cannot be ruled out (although this claim has not been rigorously argued).

There are three questions which, depending on the vantage point adopted, can be regarded as central. First, how likely are such circumstances? Second, would it be in the general national interest for there to be a major reduction (taking into account the interests of the copper users too)? And third, if a reduction were thought desirable but unlikely to occur on a significant scale, what could be done by the government (or other groups representing the so-called national interest)? Largely for reasons of space, this paper has not discussed explicitly the desirability of reduced consumption, although many pertinent points have been raised in passing and they certainly have not pointed towards an overwhelming argument in favour of ‘enforced) conservation.

In a few markets, copper appears to be fighting a losing battle - if, indeed, the battle is not virtually over. Telecommunications cable and wiring is perhaps the clearest and most significant case (although, of course, that could change again over ten years, and an export market for the traditional copper product is likely to remain, even if its size is hard to forecast).

At the other extreme, it is not easy to point to major end-uses that



one can be absolutely confident will still be using copper in the present way ten years ahead, regardless of developments in the copper market. The philosophy underlying this view is that, given a high enough copper price and enough time, copper consumption could be seriously reduced in all its major applications, and even eliminated in some.

Thus, in most applications, the real questions are those of the circumstances under which further conservation would occur on a significant scale, and how plausible those conditions are.

The honest answer seems to be that no-one knows. Although an entirely satisfactory alternative to copper wiring in houses and commercial premises has yet to be commercially produced, and there is still official reluctance to employ substitutes in hot water systems (to take but two important examples), there is still enough time between now and the late 1980s for any technical developments, investment in new plant, changes in attitudes, and so on, that may be called for.

If there is a relatively stable copper price, with no clear indications of long-term shortages, then a slow continuation of the conservation trend may be expected. This is probably the most likely position in the UK, assuming no domestic intervention by the UK government (which, given the ideology and life-expectancy of the present government, is a reasonable assumption).

But in reaching this conclusion about the movement of demand in the UK, that assumption of price and supply stability is central. It is virtually certain that the next decade is going to produce major supply bottlenecks and price hikes, be they induced by strikes, political upheavals, or a continued inadequacy of investment in the supply industry running up against a boom in world demand, or anything else. Such bottlenecks not only have short-term economic effects, but are also reputed to have psychological consequences: to put it crudely, customers get fed up with the old problem arising from time to time, and switch to alternative materials. However, one cannot be sure of the longer-term consequences of a bottleneck; although the problems of the 1973-74 boom led to very few permanent moves away from copper, they did lead to the accumulation of more knowledge about how to undertake (or not undertake) such a move, and this adds to the pool of experience to be drawn on next time around (eg in the early 198Os?). As regards the possibilities of a hike in prices and supply shortages lasting longer (several years), there are too many uncertainties to permit a useful positive conclusion here.

If the conditions that would lead to significant conservation moves do not arise, should the government be ready to bring about actions that would encourage further conservation? We pass over this controversial issue here, save to make one observation. It would be only under relatively extreme conditions that it would be clearly in the national interest to make radical changes to the way that copper is used in the UK (eg if there arose major shortages or price increases); thus, it is only in such circumstances that there would be a clear need for action to be taken on conservation. However, these are just the kinds of conditions that would lead the copper users themselves to be seeking radical changes and, to that extent, a lead from government would be redundant.

In this particular scenario, the copper users would undoubtedly be talking to the appropriate government bodies about what could be



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done to ease the immediate situation, and the kinds of measure that would assist in conservation (eg some types of fiscal measures) might well be sought by the industry. What is clearly important if such a situation arose would be not to lose sight of the longer-term outlook; for instance, had there been a major switch to aluminium conducts when the copper price was high (1973-74), by now the industry might have spent four or five years lamenting the move, because copper then dropped to the lowest real price that has been seen for many decades.

This paper began by mentioning some of the kinds of actions that have been put forward to help conserve materials, with copper often a foremost target. This analysis has suggested that, in many cases, implementing such actions would be difficult and, second, would create many disbenefits for the users of copper, disbenefits needing careful thought before it is assumed that they are outweighed by benefits to the nation as a whole. Finally, there is a very definite role for studies conducted inside or outside the industry, with the aim of ensuring that all the potentially sensible ways of reducing copper consumption further are receiving the attention that they merit.


conservation policies and copper in the uk

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