Raw materials or commodities are being traded on the different commodity markets. They are metals, chemicals, mass produced food products and fuels. Big somewhat virtual markets for trading futures of commodities will not exist in the Agoracentric world, there should be no reason to buy from beyond the horizon. That said these materials should come from somewhere if they are needed and used, how does an agoracentric community produce them?
An important source is recovering it from waste. Whatever is thrown away can be a source of metals, plastics, chemicals. The key to that recovery is energy, the more energy one invests the more specific and complex the recovery processes can be. There are low energy separation processes for metals and plastics, there is a method to turn plastic back into oil etc.
Of course the best thing is to use less waste producing materials, it will mean less work and for instance plastic packaging may not even be possible if oil has run out.
There would only be one kind of future contract, for to be sown foodcrops. In order to pay the labour needed a farmer can sell shares of his harvest forward. The value of the shares is determined by the succes of the harvest, so those who buy take a risk.
Metals
Metals can be very efficiently recycled, most of the copper and iron is recycled today. Rather than doing that using coal fired or electric ovens one can do it by wind and solar thermal heated systems. Some use of metals may be replaced by wood.Chemicals
Many chemical commodities will not be needed in the agoracentric world. An important absent category would be those used in agriculture. Many chemicals that are now a byproduct of the ptrochemical industry would have to be made in other ways. Oils, methane, alcohol and ammonia would be available.Cracking Plastic Using Microwave
Fuels
Fuels can not include fossil sources, any burning must be carbon neutral, so involve organic materialOrganic pulp and oils
Ammonia (electrically generated)
Hydrogen (electrically generated)
There are 4 comments on this page. [Display comments]