Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Extraction of Aluminium
Aluminium is the third most abundant element (8.3% by weight) in the earth's crust after oxygen
(45.5%) and silicon (25.7%). The important minerals of aluminium are:
a) Bauxite, AlOx(OH)3-2x (0 < x <1) or Al2O3.2H2O
b) Cryolite, Na3AlF6
c) Orthoclase, KAlSi3O8
d) Mica (muscovite), KAl2(Si3AlOl0)(OH)2
e) Beryl, Be3Al2Si6O18
f) Corundum, Al2O3
Aluminium is extracted from bauxite. Bauxite consists of mainly 50-60% of aluminium oxide.Crude
bauxite is contaminated with impurities like ferric oxide(Fe 2O3),silica(SiO2) and small amount of
titanium dioxide(TiO2) etc. Aluminium is commonly extracted from its ore by electrolysis process.
The bauxite which contains much ferric oxide and little silica,is known as red bauxite. Bauxite which
contains much silica and less ferric oxide is called white bauxite
Pure Aluminium metal is extracted from bauxite in a three-stage process.
a) Purification of Bauxite (Bayers Process or modern wet process) to obtain pure Alumina.
b) Electrolysis of pure Alumina in molten cryolite (Na3AlF6) (Halls process).
c) Refining of Aluminium (Hoopes process).
Purification of bauxite
(a)Baeyer's process or modern wet process---for--red bauxite
(b)Serpeck's process---for---white bauxite
(c)Hall's process----for---low grade bauxite
(a) Bauxite contains silicon dioxide (SiO2), iron oxides and titanium(IV) oxide as impurities. The
bauxite ore is digested with a concentrated solution of sodium hydroxide at 473-523 K and 35-36 bar
pressure. Aluminium oxide and silica dissolve to form sodium aluminate (NaAlO 2) and sodium silicate
respectively leaving behind iron oxide and TiO2, which are filtered off.
The filtrate containing sodium aluminate and sodium silicate is diluted and seeded with freshly
precipitated aluminium hydroxide, which induces the precipitation of aluminium hydroxide leaving
behind sodium silicate in solution.
The aluminium hydroxide is filtered dried and calcined at 1473 K to yield pure alumina.
Al(OH)3 Al2O3 + 3H2O
1
B.SC. 2nd year(Inorganic Chemistry)
At anode
F- ions are oxidized and nascent fluorine so produced reacts with Al2O3 to form AlF3 and dioxygen gas.
At cathode
Aluminium ions get reduced to give aluminium metal.
2
B.SC. 2nd year(Inorganic Chemistry)
The dioxygen gas liberated at carbon anode reacts with carbon to form CO gas which either escapes
out or is burnt to produce CO2.
Since during electrolysis the carbon electrodes get consumed they have to be replaced periodically.