2007-01-22 18:43:54 · 6 answers · asked by Janelle Alexandria 3 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Chemistry
Aluminium is about the 4th or 5th most common element in the Earth's crust, but it's so reactive that you'll only find it combined with other elements. Most minerals which contain it can't be smelted economically, so only a few of them, like bauxite and cryolite are worth anything commercially. If you go to the beach and collect some clay it contains aluminium which with today's technology could be extracted, but it would cost too much. Here in NZ we've got cheap electricity, which we sort of export by using it to smelt aluminium ore. You can't store electricity or send it very far in cables without losing a lot, so we import alumina, add some cryolite to lower the melting point, use our cheap electricity to extract the metal and export the aluminium ingots. Aluminium, although so common, wasn't purified until the 19th century.
2007-01-22 19:02:53 · answer #1 · answered by zee_prime 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Aluminum is found in nature as bauxite. To extract the aluminum from the bauxite requires lots of electricity. So this is a very expensive process.....
2007-01-23 02:53:42 · answer #2 · answered by nicewknd 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Aluminum comes from bauxite. Here are two sites about it. One formal and the other from someone's journal which I am posting here below the links...
http://volcano.und.nodak.edu/vwdocs/minerals/bauxite.html
http://www.oneworldyouthproject.org/archive/2004_11_14_archive.html
No one stopped us as we drove in. Granny rolled down her window and yelled to a worker on the side of the road...
"What are y'all making here?"
"What?!" the worker yelled back.
"What are y'all making here?!"
"Aluminum."
"What?"
"Aluminum."
"Aluminum?"
"Aluminum."
"Why is it red?"
"Boxite. That's what aluminum comes from."
"Balsite?"
"Boxite...clay."
"Is it dangerous?"
"No! It's for pots and pans."
"Pots and pans?"
"It turns into pots and pans."
"Why is its residue all everywhere?"
"That's the way boxite come... you have to cook it and boil it...then it comes out like powder...then you re-cook it...then it becomes aluminum."
"Oh. And, do they let you take a tour?"
"What?!"
"Can you take a tour of the plant?"
We didn't get a very clear answer to the last question...haha.
2007-01-23 02:55:00 · answer #3 · answered by Bena 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
aluminum is naturally found as an oxide.
Aluminum oxide or Al2O3
2007-01-23 02:53:59 · answer #4 · answered by tedhyu 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
in bauxite mines. bauxite is the ore of aluminum
2007-01-23 02:52:29 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Well my answer to that question is; you ask a scientist
2007-01-23 02:51:55 · answer #6 · answered by michael aguila 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋