Is lead the new gold ?

[LopezBart]

Stained Glass hobbiest here... 60 40 Lead solder... used to be 4.95/lb... NOW it's 32.99/lb... WTF.

This has almost nothing to do with the cost of lead, and everything to do with the cost of tin.

 

[lolaetype]

Mining and refining lead has historically been a dirty business.

When I was in college in mid-Missouri in the mid 1970's we toured a lead mine near Salem, Missouri. I wish I'd taken pictures. We took a large elevator down several hundred feet (about 800 feet, IIRC) and entered massive caverns with front end loaders, dump trucks and the like running around. We were told that equipment was disassembled, taken down on the elevator and then reassembled. Ore was blasted, loaded and taken to an underground crusher and conveyor that transported it to a smelting operation on the surface.

We visited the smelting operation but had to park our cars some distance away and ride in on company trucks that were rusting apart although they were fairly new. One of the byproducts of the smelting operation is sulfuric acid. Picture huge kettles of molten lead being used to cast large ingots. Again, IIRC, that area produced and still produces about 90% of the lead produced in the U.S. and is down to about 7% of the world's total production. I believe that particular mine has since shut down.

I'd be surprised if that smelter site was adequately cleaned up.

Missouri also leads the nation in lead acid battery recycling and runs a smelter that handles that recycled lead and, I think, primary lead.

 

[Skooterj]

There is not one single lead smelting plant left in existence in the US. The EPA shut them all down. I think that the same goes for other metals in the US, with the exception of steel.

And there probably never will be a new one. No local community is going to allow a known pollution contributor to start production anywhere near them. Same reason the US hasn't had a new large capacity oil refinery built since the 70's.

 

[racecougar]

When I was in college in mid-Missouri in the mid 1970's we toured a lead mine near Salem, Missouri. I wish I'd taken pictures. We took a large elevator down several hundred feet (about 800 feet, IIRC) and entered massive caverns with front end loaders, dump trucks and the like running around. We were told that equipment was disassembled, taken down on the elevator and then reassembled. Ore was blasted, loaded and taken to an underground crusher and conveyor that transported it to a smelting operation on the surface.

We visited the smelting operation but had to park our cars some distance away and ride in on company trucks that were rusting apart although they were fairly new. One of the byproducts of the smelting operation is sulfuric acid. Picture huge kettles of molten lead being used to cast large ingots. Again, IIRC, that area produced and still produces about 90% of the lead produced in the U.S. and is down to about 7% of the world's total production. I believe that particular mine has since shut down.

I'd be surprised if that smelter site was adequately cleaned up.

Missouri also leads the nation in lead acid battery recycling and runs a smelter that handles that recycled lead and, I think, primary lead.

Guessing you went to Rolla? I graduated from there in '05.

Speaking of lead mines and Superfund sites, a really popular one is St. Joe State Park in Park Hills, MO. The tailings area alone is ~800 acres. It's been capped with 12" of chat and turned into a 2,000 acre off-road park.

 

[lolaetype]

Guessing you went to Rolla? I graduated from there in '05.

Indeed I did, about 30 years before you did.

 

[MushCreek]

Maybe the Olympics should issue a lead medal for highly touted athletes that crash and burn instead. Kind of a 'Razzies' for sports.

 

[Ak Jim]

maybe the cost of lead is so high because people can't afford sail boats anymore so there are less to scrap when they go bad. Or we've lost less sail boats to hurricanes. (The keels are lead filled to keep them upright). From what I hear, that is the least costly way to buy lead.

I think lead is expensive because every place smelting lead (at least that’s what I think it is called) in the US has been closed down by the EPA.

 

[threepiece]

Has anyone bought carbide lately? I have been buying carbide tooling at the scrap yard at $10 per pound for over a decade. A few weeks ago I was told it was now $25. I wonder if it has gone up again. I suspect the move to domestic manufacturing has something to do with this increas.