An assessment of the global supply, recycling, stocks in use and market price for titanium using the WORLD7 model

Abstract

The change in supply, price, extractable resources and recycling with time for titanium was assessed with the WORLD7 model. Demand for titanium is expected to increase in the future, and several future scenarios were investigated. The model is mass balance based and simulates the flow terms past from 1850 to 2023 and the flows in the future from 2024 to 2200. The recoverable mineral resources have been estimated at about 1800 million ton of titanium element after a review of the literature. Only 500 million ton of titanium mineral resources count as high grade, the rest is found in ores with low or very low content. Our findings are that for all scenarios, the WORLD7 model simulations shows that there will be no significant shortages in the short term (before 2050), but in the longer term there will be scarcity issues appearing after 2075 for both metal and oxide supply. If demand increase more than anticipated by market analysts, scarcity may develop decades earlier. The model makes estimates for titanium oxide and titanium metal demand, extraction, supply, recycling, losses and the development of major stocks in society.