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And needlessly passive aggressive posts drive me nuts. Production will rise to meet supply, but that does not mean it will do so smoothly or easily. Perhaps accessible olivine is limited. Perhaps current extraction methods would be too expensive at scale. We just don't know.


Of you watch the video on the landing page they describe that olivine is a very common by-product of mining for other stuff. Currently the practice is to just pile it up, as it's worthless. So you don't even need to mine it (at least until demand scales way up) - just go to nearest mine and pick it up.


In much the same way, you can fuel a Diesel engine with a free waste product (used deep fat frying oil), which some people would even pay you to take away.

Only thing is, once a significant number of people started doing that, it generally stopped being free — people started charging money for it.


That might be why GP was asking a question rather than making an assertion.


If there's a limited overall supply it follows that increased demand will move the price upwards. If supply can easily scale to meet demand, then scaling effects take over and prices can come down. The economics of the situation are largely dependant on factors that few people have enough information to really assess (mining rates, total unmined supply, etc)


Your post is utterly and needlessly condescending. Exactly what prompted you to respond to the other poster like that?


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Please don't be a jerk, even if someone else was. The guidelines ask you to flag egregious comments and move on.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html




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