Exergy Evaluation of the Mineral Capital on Earth: Influence of the Reference Environment

The mineral capital on Earth is assessed from a 2nd law of thermodynamics approach. This requires to define precisely the Reference Environment (R.E.). Therefore, the exergy difference of the mineral capital generated from different R.E. is calculated. A sensitivity analysis is done to measure the influence of the element chemical exergy and other physical parameters of the R.E. on the mineral’s exergy. The exergy of the world mineral reserves, base reserves and world resources is obtained: 0.75, 1.08 and 6.59 Gtoe, respectively.Copyright © 2005 by ASME