So I've been digging into the copper story lately, and honestly it's pretty compelling if you're thinking about clean energy exposure. The whole transition to renewables is going to need massive amounts of copper - we're talking solar, wind, EVs, all of it. One research firm put out numbers suggesting copper demand could jump 82% between 2021 and 2035, which is pretty wild when you think about it.

The thing is, copper prices have gotten beat up recently thanks to China slowdown, so there might be some interesting entry points if you believe in the longer-term story. If you're looking to get exposure without picking individual mining stocks, there are some solid copper ETF options worth checking out.

First up is CPER - that's the US Copper ETF from USCF. Pretty straightforward, it just tracks copper futures. Launched back in 2012, it's got about $125 million in assets and charges 0.88% in fees. Not the cheapest, but it's a pure play if that's what you want.

If you'd rather own the actual miners, COPX is the big player here. It's the GX Copper Miners ETF and it's been around since 2011. This one holds companies actually mining copper - we're talking Southern Copper, Freeport-McMoRan, Ivanhoe Mines, that crew. It's got solid assets at $1.4 billion and a reasonable 0.65% expense ratio.

Then there's COPJ from Sprott, which is newer - came out in 2023. This one focuses on smaller and mid-cap copper miners, so it's more of a higher-risk, higher-reward play. Smaller AUM at around $5 million, but 0.75% fees.

For something broader, BlackRock's ICOP tracks copper and metals mining companies globally. It's got the big names like Freeport-McMoRan, BHP, Ivanhoe in there. Only 0.47% in fees, which is pretty competitive, and about $5 million in assets.

If you want even more diversification beyond just copper, PICK is also BlackRock and covers the whole non-precious metals mining space. It's the cheapest at 0.39% fees and has $1.1 billion in assets. Holds BHP, Rio Tinto, FCX and others.

Looking at year-to-date performance, most of these have been down a bit - CPER's basically flat, but COPX is down a couple percent, COPJ down 4%, ICOP down 4%, and PICK down 7%. That's actually not terrible considering the headwinds in the sector.

The way I see it, if you're bullish on the clean energy transition and think copper's got room to run, any of these copper ETF options could give you that exposure. Just depends on whether you want pure futures, major miners, or smaller explorers. Worth keeping an eye on as the energy transition story develops.