economy, no longer having access to these resources could be problematic. The economist Julian Simon argued that we will never run out of non-renewable resources,3 and it’s worth understanding his reasoning.
Simon made a bet with Paul Ehrlich, a biologist concerned that the world’s growing population would lead us to run out of resources, especially those that are not renewable. Ehrlich’s logic is easy to understand: as more people use more of these resources, either because there are more people or because the same number of people use more, there will be fewer of them left.
The famous Simon–Ehrlich wager took place in 1980.4 Ehrlich chose $1,000 worth of five metals – copper, chromium, nickel, tin, and tungsten. He bet that ten years later the inflation-adjusted value of these metals would be higher, which is what you would expect if they were becoming scarcer relative to demand. It is a basic tenet of economics, accepted by both Simon and Ehrlich, that when demand increases relative to supply (in other words, when there is the same amount of something but more people want it, or when the same number of people want something but there is less of it) prices will increase. Simon, who was not concerned that we would run out of resources, bet that the collective price would decrease.
Simon won the wager; collectively the prices in 1990 had decreased. It’s worth noting that there were periods of time during that decade in which the prices actually had increased; if the bet had been called at that point, Ehrlich would have won. But the broader trend was on Simon’s side, and it’s useful to explore both the mechanisms for that and their implications for the possibility of using up non-renewable resources.
It is because these resources become more expensive as they become scarcer (or as demand increases relative to supply) that several other important processes are set in motion. We are more likely to conserve, to substitute, and to innovate because of the increasing cost. For purposes of illustration, let’s examine what happens with oil, which includes things such as the gasoline used in most motor vehicles.
When oil becomes scarcer, gasoline prices rise. When fuel costs more, we are likely to use less of it, both as individuals and as a society. Some people might start to carpool to get to work, so that more people are commuting with the same amount of gasoline. Others might wait between trips to the supermarket, so that they use less gasoline per trip. Industry users will try to figure out whether they can become more efficient in their use of fuel, because it costs more. Can they heat or cool buildings less? Run machinery less often? Capture waste heat from mechanical processes to help heat buildings? All of these approaches can fit under the idea of conservation.
We also may be more likely to find substitutes for scarcer, or more expensive, resources. Some people will start taking the bus or subway instead of driving, which could count as both conservation (of fuel) and substitution (of mode of transportation). An electric utility that previously generated electricity with fossil fuels might instead substitute nuclear power or electricity generated by wind. Any of these approaches might have been less convenient or more expensive than using fossil fuels, but once the price of fossil fuel rises the substitution makes sense.
Underpinning all of this is innovation. Because people want to conserve gasoline when it becomes more expensive, they will be more likely to buy fuel-efficient cars, so that gives an incentive to automobile engineers to develop cars that use less fuel. Finding other ways to provide energy that doesn’t rely on fossil fuels also makes sense as prices rise – someone has to innovate the ways to get energy from wind or sun and to connect it to a power grid, and it is worthwhile spending the money and effort to do that if the cost of fossil fuels is higher.
Another aspect of innovation involves accessing resources that are more remote and difficult to retrieve. As oil prices rose in the 1970s for a variety of reasons, oil companies were willing to invest more resources in exploration. Since they could earn more per unit of oil they could access, they were able to invest more in finding or extracting it. It was during this period, for instance, when drilling for oil in the deep ocean (such as the North Sea) became cost-effective.5 It was hard, and dangerous, and required the invention of new technologies to be able to drill deeper and extract and transport the oil. But it was worthwhile for oil companies to invest in this technology, and for inventors to work to create it, because the amount for which each barrel of oil would sell had increased. Likewise, it was worth exploring for oil in places where it was less likely to be found, because, if it were discovered, the payoff would make up for some of the unsuccessful efforts.
We could do the same mental exercise with any non-renewable resource, such as trees or water. As they become scarcer, individuals and society will conserve, substitute, and innovate in ways that both decrease use of the resource and access new reserves of it. So why is it, when we could have more renewable resources if we were just able to leave them be for a while, that we so frequently do deplete these resources, sometimes beyond recovery?
Although demand is the most important determinant of resource prices, these processes of conservation, substitution, and innovation help account for the volatility in prices (and the reason that, in some years of the decade-long bet, Ehrlich would have won the wager he made with Simon). After prices rise and these factors change behavior, prices are likely to fall as the new sources have been accessed and conservation and substitution have decreased consumption. The price trend may be generally upwards, but with notable fluctuations. Some of the conservation and substitution will likely stick, however: once you’ve bought a more fuel-efficient car, you are likely to use less gasoline, and when you have building materials made out of plastic or aluminum you are no longer in the market for wood.
Were we to get to a point when we were almost out of oil or rare earth elements, or even wood, the price of that resource would be so high that it wouldn’t be cost effective to extract or use it. By that point society will have shifted to other ways of providing energy or technological components or building materials. It is in that sense that we will not run out.
The story of innovation and conservation sounds seamless, but it isn’t. When prices increase, real people suffer – especially those who are poor. New fuel-efficient or alternative energy cars may be invented, but, for people who simply can’t afford to buy a new car, increasing fuel prices will make their lives, at least in the short run, more difficult. The same situation transpires when policies are put in place to decrease the use of these resources through making them more expensive (either directly, by taxing them, or indirectly, by requiring decreased use, which increases the price). Not everyone will bear the same level of personal cost or disruption from these changes. Anticipation of such harms may make those types of policies politically unfeasible. People concerned that addressing climate change will make fuel prices higher may vote or work against taking action, even if they are concerned about climate change, because they fear the short-term costs. There are ways that these policies can be made less difficult for portions of the population, and considering those types of policies may help avoid some of the political pitfalls of trying to change environmental behavior.
Even though we may not, technically, use up the last of these resources, there are other reasons to pay attention to them. An important aspect of environmental concern is the ecological destruction that results from extracting resources. Once the most easily accessible sources of these materials have been exhausted, removing them can cause serious damage to landscapes and ecosystems. Mountaintop removal to access underground coal destroys ecosystems and pollutes waterways; mining and processing metals can put toxic chemicals and other dangerous substances into the air and water, among other harms.
Many of these non-renewable resources are themselves the cause of serious pollution, even apart from their extraction. Coal, oil, and gas cause air pollution and are major contributors to global climate change. So even if we are not in danger of actually running out of them, their use causes damage to the environment.
What is Politics?
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