A $5B hoard of aluminum

Post by ivalm » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 10:37 PM UTC

pdabbadabba wrote: post #66

jaywalk wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fire releases the "heat, light and various reaction products" that it does because of the speed of oxidation. It's obvious even from the snippet I posted that slow oxidation is not actually a fire.

Yes, but aluminum oxidizes rapidly yet this oxidation process does not produce significant heat and light. So in this context, the independent heat/light requirement makes a difference!

Post by beervirus » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 10:40 PM UTC

downrightmike wrote: post #32

marcosdumay wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It keeps increasing (exponentially slower, thus with a finite total depth) even without any other chemical. Anyway, out on the world there are many chemicals that can make it deeper, can peel it from the metal so another layer forms, or can mix with it and make it less insulating. I would be surprised if loses are as low as 1% as people point on this thread, but shouldn't be very large either.

Oxidation is technically a fire, albeit very slow

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 10:46 PM UTC

AlexanderDhoore wrote: post #38

adolph wrote: post #29

the aluminium industry consumed 6% of all global coal-fired electricity in 2019 – more coal-fired electricity than is generated in the whole of Europe – and is actually becoming more reliant on coal at a time when the world is becoming less reliant on coal. https://ember-climate.org/commentary/2020/10/06/aluminium/ The aluminium sector has a pivotal role to play here. Accounting for 1.1 billion tonnes of CO2 emission…

"at a time when the world is becoming less reliant on coal" No, we aren't becoming less reliant on coal. We should be but we aren't. Look at [1]. We actually consume more coal, oil and gas each and every year. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/energy-mix

Post by CameronNemo » Mon, Nov 29, 2021, 11:43 PM UTC

barelysapient wrote: post #68

AlexanderDhoore wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"at a time when the world is becoming less reliant on coal" No, we aren't becoming less reliant on coal. We should be but we aren't. Look at [1]. We actually consume more coal, oil and gas each and every year. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/energy-mix

Depends by who you mean by 'we'. If you mean America, then coal consumption is down by nearly 50% since 2000[1]. If you mean the EU, then you'll be pleased to know we've also reduced our coal consumption substantially. The principle increase in coal use is China. They've almost 4x their use of coal in the last 20 years. They also are leading the world in construction of new coal consuming power plants -- both in Chin…

Post by dboreham » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 1:11 AM UTC

robocat wrote: post #48

monocasa wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, until the Bayer process was discovered to pull aluminum out of bauxite in the late 1880s, it was worth more than gold. Tutankhamen had an aluminum ankh very close to his body for that reason. And even for a long time after that, before we had a critical mass of aluminum for recycling, it was still extremely expensive because of how capital and energy intensive the Bayer process is. For that fifty or so years it…

> Tutankhamen had an aluminum ankh The ability to make Aluminium would be alien technology to the ancient Egyptian culture. There’s a good reason it’s production was only discovered in modern times. My guess is that you were thinking of Tutankhamun's meteoric iron dagger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tutankhamun%27s_meteoric_iron_... “Nineteen iron objects were discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamun, including a set o…