tellurium, page-3

In 2002 in a book entitled The Life Cycle of Copper, its Co-Products and By-Products, published by Kluwer for the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, by Ayres, Ayres and Rade, the following paragraph appears:

4.8.12. Tellurium [Andersson 2000]: Tellurium is the scarcest of all the by-product metals, except for gold . Crustal abundance is 0.005 ppm. It is mainly recovered from copper ores (1.5-3 ppm), where it is considerably enriched. There are two known deposits where tellurium is found at much higher concentrations, one in Mexico (0.2%) and one in China. Tellurium has a significant potential use in thin-film cadmium telluride (CdTe) photovoltaic cells.

A link to lengthy article on Tellurium:
http://www.resourceinvestor.com/News/2009/7/Pages/The-tellurium-supply-conjecture.aspx

B&Y