Vale Nickel Refinery nearly done.

[ZenOps]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repor...rticle2274215/

http://www.republicofmining.com/2011...eptember-2011/

We need the $2.8 Billion 50,000 ton/year nickel refinery much more than an oil refinery. Should be finished sometime in 2013.

The world hit peak nickel arguably sometime around 1980, Canada hit peak nickel arugably somewhere around 1999, and we've all be running on reserves since then.

Based on 9.5 tons per cubic meter, they should be capable of pushing out 14.5 cubic meters of nickel per day. Which is a "good enough" stopgap for a decade or two at least.

Its extremely important - as we no longer have enough to put in our 7 gram loonies and toonies (and even less available for export as a modern currency metal) for circulation to a mere 30 million people.

Britain may want to move to a 25% nickel composition (currently 5.5%) for their British Pound to reduce counterfeiting and re-install confidence in their currency, and there is no way in hell we can provide it without this refinery. Britain produces no nickel locally.

[SJW]

My bro is the refinery super up in Thompson, MB. They be shuttin that puppy down in 4 years.

[ZenOps]

Yup, a lot of the nickel mines are nearing end of life.

The worldwide nickel shortage has even forced the British to go to Iron for much of their coinage.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/p...-disaster.html

The only reason the US gets away with still producing a 5 cent coin with 25% nickel (1.25 grams) is because its actually legally required.

But the *day* that they have to go to iron after 145 years of the same metal content is the same day that the US loses a mountain of credibility as the worlds currency.

Nickel being 920x rarer than iron (and in some nations, traded as such, two pounds of nickel for one ton of iron is not unheard of)

Offer me the scrap iron content of an average sized car, or two pounds of nickel... And I would take the nickel.

History lesson: 20 US nickels back in 1889 would have been fairly traded as a coinage equivalent to a 1.672 gram 90% Gold dollar.

[kertejud2]

Yes, even though people accept cotton-paper bills, they'll truly lose faith in a currency because the five cent coin is made from a different metal.

Is it a coincidence that the darkest days of the Canadian dollar coincided with the switching of the penny's material from copper to zinc? Of course not. The resurgence of the Canadian dollar came with the switch from zinc to steel and the subsequent increase in worldwode steel prices (thank you Chinese construction boom). Or did the price of steel increase because of the confidence in Canadian pennies? That's up to the hedge fund managers dealing in currency futures to decide.

[ZenOps]

US fears the day, but its coming soon.

http://news.coinupdate.com/legislati...-nickels-1117/

Its not just a matter of printing more money and shipping it to Canada. We literally have been running low on nickel for decades now, nickel is not sellable at any price if we have no excess for sale.

Zinc is just as rare as copper, but has little industrial uses - So they could technically stay with the Zinc cored pennies for a while.

Its the nickels that are problematic.

[CapnCrunch]

Originally posted by kertejud2
Yes, even though people accept cotton-paper bills, they'll truly lose faith in a currency because the five cent coin is made from a different metal.

[ZenOps]

I don't know if thats sarcasm. But the fall of the Roman empire was preceded by the debasement of the Antoninianus from 40% silver to 2%.

To bring the mentality of what was considered "equal" before 1964, you could have easily traded 5 nickels for 1 silver quarter (about $5.20 in silver as of today) without a second thought.

Making 1.25 grams of nickel 3.75 grams of copper in the US roughly metal equivalent to $1 worth of silver.

According to Canada, 7 grams of nickel in finished currency based form worth about $1 (The loonie) in 2010.

Perception of value is a strange beast. Here in Canada we live in a land of plenty. The only thing that suprises me is that they only spent $3 billion on the refinery and not something closer to $20 billion.

Its like Taco bell and their "beef", which is technically only 36% beef, when its required by law to be 40% beef. What happens when they lower the requirements to 2% beef to be called "beef"? I'd bet someone would try to get away with 1.5%... Thats usually about time that people start getting angry.

[codetrap]

Originally posted by ZenOps
Zinc is just as rare as copper, but has little industrial uses - So they could technically stay with the Zinc cored pennies for a while.

Rare? Little industrial uses? It's the 4th most commonly used metal in industry.

[ZenOps]

Originally posted by codetrap


Rare? Little industrial uses? It's the 4th most commonly used metal in industry.

Yup, its still little used based on availablity - its important to note that its readily available. No foreseeable shortages in the next decade.

Copper is 15 million tonnes per year, Zinc is 12.5 million tonnes, Nickel is 1.3 million tonnes.

When Nickel and copper are used as "money" its usually based on a ratio. Gold to silver rarity is 15.5x. Nickel to Copper is 11.5x, as a currency metal - if Copper is $4 per pound Nickel should be around $46 per pound, or somewhere around $3 per ounce.

Zinc is not considered a monetary metal yet, and hence trades for about 90 cents per pound. If it was a monetary metal - it would probably be $4 a pound right now.

That nickel is only $8 a pound right now might be the bargain of the decade.