Tonnes of Resources Mined from Earth This Year
CURRENT TOTAL
Live Counter Notable Facts
(Data shown in the table is for 2025. Counter shows current estimate)
Annual Global Extraction
Per Second Rate
Per Capita
Understanding Tonnes of Resources Mined from Earth This Year
This counter tracks the massive volume of materials extracted from the Earth's crust in real-time, including minerals, metals, fossil fuels, and construction materials. The relentless extraction of resources reflects humanity's insatiable demand for materials to fuel economic growth and development.
The world is now consuming more than 100 billion tonnes of materials annually through unsustainable resource extraction that's causing immense harm to the global environment. This represents a quadrupling of resource consumption since 1970, with extraction accelerating in recent years.
This extraction includes everything from sand and gravel for construction to precious metals for electronics, coal for energy, and rare earth elements for renewable technologies. The environmental impact is profound - forests are being lost, coastal environments destroyed, waterways poisoned, and ecosystems ravaged.
Global Resource Extraction Overview
- China was the world's biggest extractor of domestic materials in 2023, extracting a total of 34.2 billion tonnes of materials, including biomass, fossil fuels, metal ores, and non-metallic minerals - more than four times either India or the United States.
- Resource consumption has quadrupled around the world since 1970, with the average person now consuming an estimated 13 tonnes per year. The rate of increase has been accelerating - resource consumption doubled between 2000 and 2017.
- Minerals and ores account for the majority of resources used annually, while fossil fuels account for 15%, and crops and trees nearly 25%. Non-metallic materials like sand and gravel make up the largest portion at about 50% of total extraction.
- Without urgent action, resource extraction is projected to double again by 2060, reaching over 190 billion tonnes annually. The UN warns that continuing at this pace risks global disaster as finite resources are depleted.
Resource Extraction Terminology
- Domestic Material Extraction: Total amount of materials extracted from the natural environment within a country
- Material Footprint: Total amount of raw materials extracted to meet final consumption demands
- Non-Metallic Minerals: Sand, gravel, limestone, clay and other construction materials
- Biomass: Crops, wood, fish and other biological materials extracted for human use
Resource Extraction by Category (2025)
- Non-metallic minerals: 50 billion tonnes (45%)
- Fossil fuels: 16.5 billion tonnes (15%)
- Biomass: 27.5 billion tonnes (25%)
- Metal ores: 11 billion tonnes (10%)
- Other materials: 5.5 billion tonnes (5%)
Top Resource Extracting Countries
- China: 34.2 billion tonnes (31% of global)
- India: 8.03 billion tonnes (7.3%)
- United States: 7.98 billion tonnes (7.3%)
- Indonesia: 5.2 billion tonnes (4.7%)
- Brazil: 4.8 billion tonnes (4.4%)
Environmental Impacts
- Deforestation: Mining causes 7% of global forest loss
- Water use: Mining consumes 1% of global water
- Greenhouse gases: Mining produces 4-7% of global emissions
- Biodiversity loss: Mining threatens 35% of protected areas
- Waste generation: 100+ billion tonnes of mining waste annually
Data Sources and References
Methodology and Data Collection
Global resource extraction data is compiled from national mining statistics, geological surveys, and international databases including UNEP's Global Material Flows Database, which tracks extraction of biomass, fossil fuels, metal ores, and non-metallic minerals.
The real-time counter applies a rate of 3,486 tonnes per second based on annual global extraction of approximately 110 billion tonnes, incorporating seasonal variations in mining activities and construction cycles.