Hi dave, thanks for flagging this. yeah this is on p123 here. It seems like mine production is different to total consumption—we’re mining more than we consume it would appear. From the point of view of running out of the resource, consumption rather than consumption is what matters, and USGS says “World consumption of P2O5 contained in fertilizer and industrial uses was projected to increase to 49 million tons in 2024 from 47 million tons in 2020.”
Unprocessed phosphate rock has a concentration of 1.7-8.7% phosphorus by mass (4-20% phosphorus pentoxide).
In 2021, the United States Geological Survey (USGS) estimated that economically extractable phosphate rock reserves worldwide are 71 billion tons, while world mining production in 2020 was 223 million tons.[5] Assuming zero growth, the reserves would thus last for 260 years.
So I think reserves are in phosphate rock, so you need to have production/consumption in terms of phosphate rock, not in terms of P2O5. That’s why it’s only 260 years. It would be very strange if the mining of something were five times as much as the consumption, especially over the longer term.
Hi dave, thanks for flagging this. yeah this is on p123 here. It seems like mine production is different to total consumption—we’re mining more than we consume it would appear. From the point of view of running out of the resource, consumption rather than consumption is what matters, and USGS says “World consumption of P2O5 contained in fertilizer and industrial uses was projected to increase to 49 million tons in 2024 from 47 million tons in 2020.”
P2O5 is 44% phosphorus by mass. Wiki:
So I think reserves are in phosphate rock, so you need to have production/consumption in terms of phosphate rock, not in terms of P2O5. That’s why it’s only 260 years. It would be very strange if the mining of something were five times as much as the consumption, especially over the longer term.
ah good catch—i will make an alteration to the post