why so much sulfuric acid is needed?

Question

why so much sulfuric acid is needed

Answer 1

Sulfuric acid is one of the world's most produced chemicals as you probably know. Most of it goes into fertiliser in the form of ammonium sulfate and super phosphate. In addition, there are many, many other uses for it because it is a catalyst for a wide number of reactions, a dehydrating agent and of course a strong acid. Uses include:

lead acid batteries
petroleum refining
catalyst for making artificial flavourings
detergents
plastics
explosives
dyes
metal leaching
metal cleaning eg steel prior to galvanising

... almost any chemical you care to think of.

Answer 2

For what? If you're speaking generally, it's because it's so useful. Sulfuric acid is used in ore processing, fertilizer manufacturing, oil refining, wastewater processing, and chemical synthesis. They also use it to clean metals, to help in paper making, and drain cleaners. It can be used in a hydrogen cycle that has been proposed as a way to produce hydrogen for fuel. It's the most commonly produced chemical in the US below water.

Answer 3

Sulfuric acid is a very important commodity chemical, and indeed a nation's sulfuric acid production is a good indicator of its industrial strength.[3] The major use (60% of total worldwide) for sulfuric acid is in the "wet method" for the production of phosphoric acid, used for manufacture of phosphate fertilizers as well as trisodium phosphate for detergents. In this method phosphate rock is used, and more than 100 million tonnes is processed annually. This raw material is shown below as fluorapatite, though the exact composition may vary. This is treated with 93% sulfuric acid to produce calcium sulfate, hydrogen fluoride (HF) and phosphoric acid. The HF is removed as hydrofluoric acid. The overall process can be represented as:

Ca5F(PO4)3 + 5 H2SO4 + 10 H2O → 5 CaSO4·2 H2O + HF + 3 H3PO4
Sulphuric acid is used in large quantities in iron and steel making principally as pickling-acid used to remove oxidation, rust and scale from rolled sheet and billets prior to sale into the automobile and white-goods business. The used acid is often re-cycled using an acid recovery plant in which the acid is boiled away from the dissolved iron salts, often using a submerged hydrogen-oxygen flame as the heat source.

Ammonium sulfate, an important nitrogen fertilizer is most commonly produced as a by-product from coking plants supplying the iron and steel making plants, Reacting the ammonia produced in the thermal decomposition of coal with waste sulphuric acid allows the ammonia to be crystalised out as a salt (often brown because of iron contamination) and sold into the agro-chemicals industry.

Another important use for sulfuric acid is for the manufacture of aluminium sulfate, also known as papermaker's alum. This can react with small amounts of soap on paper pulp fibres to give gelatinous aluminium carboxylates, which help to coagulate the pulp fibres into a hard paper surface. It is also used for making aluminium hydroxide, which is used at water treatment plants to filter out impurities, as well as to improve the taste of the water. Aluminium sulfate is made by reacting bauxite with sulfuric acid:

Al2O3 + 3 H2SO4 → Al2(SO4)3 + 3 H2O
Sulfuric acid is used for a variety of other purposes in the chemical industry. For example, it is the usual acid catalyst for the conversion of cyclohexanoneoxime to caprolactam, used for making nylon. It is used for making hydrochloric acid from salt via the Mannheim process. Much H2SO4 is used in petroleum refining, for example as a catalyst for the reaction of isobutane with isobutylene to give isooctane, a compound that raises the octane rating of gasoline (petrol). Sulfuric acid is also important in the manufacture of dyestuffs.

A mixture of sulfuric acid and water is used as the electrolyte in various types of lead-acid battery where it undergoes a reversible reaction where lead and lead dioxide are converted to lead(II) sulfate. Sulfuric acid is also the principal ingredient in some drain cleaners, used to clear blockages consisting of paper, rags, and other materials not easily dissolved by caustic solutions.

Answer 4

yeah..i knw a lot is needed.. BUT FOR WAT??