Despite perception of Japan being short of natural resources, "urban mines" mean the country actually possesses world-leading amounts of rare metals such as gold, silver, lead and indium, the National Institute for Materials Science said.

Urban mines refers to the metals found in discarded items such as cars or electrical equipment. Business interest in tapping into urban mines is on the rise, though the precise amounts of metals in existence had remained unknown.

"If we can use the urban mines, Japan would be one of the world's leading sources of resources and this could create new economic opportunities," the institute's Komei Harada said.

The institute compared estimates of 20 different rare metals in Japan's urban mines with reserves in overseas mines.

The institute estimated that Japan's urban mines contain 1,700 tons of indium -- about 61 percent of known natural reserves -- 60,000 tons of silver (22 percent of natural reserves), 6,800 tons of gold (16 percent of natural reserves) and 5.6 million tons of lead (10 percent of natural reserves).

The study also guessed that Japan's urban mines contain 1.2 billion tons of steel, which is about 2 percent of the world's natural reserves, 60 million tons of aluminum -- 0.2 percent of the total amount in the world -- and 8 percent of the world's copper, with 38 million tons.

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