PEAK WHAT?

Over recent years there has been much talk of peak this and peak that, one thing that may have slipped by is the possibility that we may be less than 30 years away from reaching peak Phosphorus. So what people might say, what's that to do with me... a lot is the answer.

As the population of our planet comes close to the 8 billion mark around 2025 (9 billion by 2050) the struggle to feed everyone is going to become more intense. Food itself is only one aspect of what is going to become (if it is not already) an increasingly complicated problem.

So far, largely out of sight and out of mind, a quiet struggle is going on to secure control of the worlds phosphorous reserves. While some countries such as India are entirely dependent upon imported phosphorous supplies all of us in the first world and elsewhere have become very dependent on relatively cheap fertilizers of which phosphorus is a vital component.

At the moment it takes around one tonne of phosphate to produce around 130 tonnes of grain. Not to mention that around 170 million tonnes of phosphate are mined every year (in 2011 (so far)) and the fact that there has been a 30 percent increase in the mining of phosphate. Geologically it is estimated that there are around 65 billion tonnes of phosphate rocks on the planet, but only around 16 billion tonnes of which can be mined economically.

Now obviously the word 'economically' is a variable and market price, demand, desperation and hunger will all have impact on the mining process so the margins will change. Interestingly enough 80% of the planets reserves can be found in Morocco and much oppressed Western Sahara.

In 2009, there was a 14.2% increase in the amount of phosphate fertiliser produced in the Peoples Republic of China - 15.8 million tonnes. The PRC itself may have phosphate reserves of around 18 billion tonnes. The PRC Government has added phosphorus to a list of around 20 minerals that China will be unable to source from inside China in anticipation of economic demand in the next 20 years.

One major problem that we all face from increased use of phosphate based or phosphate rich fertilizers is run-off. It has been estimated that around 37 million tonnes of phosphorus is leaked into the environment every year, washed into rivers, lakes and the oceans helping to fuel toxic algae and bacteria.

Food security is going to become a key issue in the first fifty years of this century along with energy security. Gradually weaning ourselves of phosphate and chemically based fertilizers might be the wise course. Not to mention significantly investing in plant breeding stations to tailor crops on a non genetic level to make best use of our soils, but, of course that would get in the way of profits.