Where Is It Found?
Vanadium is ranked 20th among elements occurring in the Earth's crust. Its abundance has been estimated at about 100 parts per million.
Apella's Vanadium deposits represent the first potential domestic supply of Vanadium inside North America. This supply could power North American economies through steel production and emerging green technologies expected to utilize vanadium. Furthermore, steel makers that have Iron ore naturally rich in Vanadium do not need to artificially strengthen the steel. Both of Apella's Vanadium deposits contain a perfect ratio of high grade Iron and Vanadium for this purpose. The main process of production suggested for Apella is also environmentally friendly.
Vanadium is found in a number of minerals, including vanadinite, carnotite, roscoelite, and patronite. Commercially, however, it is obtained as a by-product of the manufacture of iron. Slag and fly ash are purified to remove the vanadium metal contained within them. Slag is a mixture of materials that separates from iron and floats on top of the molten metal. Fly ash is a powdery material produced during the purification of iron.
The vanadium obtained from slag and fly ash is usually in the form of ferrovanadium. Ferrovanadium is a mixture of iron and vanadium. It can be used in place of pure vanadium in making alloys. Ferrovanadium saves companies the cost of making pure vanadium metal.
Most vanadium is used as ferrovanadium as an additive to improve steels. Ferrovanadium is produced directly by reducing a mixture of vanadium oxide, iron oxides and iron in an electric furnace. Vanadium-bearing magnetite iron ore is the main source for the production of vanadium. The vanadium ends up in pig iron produced from vanadium bearing magnetite. During steel production, oxygen is blown into the pig iron, oxidizing the carbon and most of the other impurities, forming slag. Depending on the used ore, the slag contains up to 25% of vanadium.
Vanadium metal is obtained via a multistep process that begins with the roasting of crushed ore with NaCl or Na2CO3 at about 850 °C to give sodium metavanadate (NaVO3). An aqueous extract of this solid is acidified to give "red cake", a polyvanadate salt, which is reduced with calcium metal. As an alternative for small scale production, vanadium pentoxide is reduced with hydrogen or magnesium. Many other methods are also in use, in all of which vanadium is produced as a byproduct of other processes. Purification of vanadium is possible by the crystal bar process developed by Anton Eduard van Arkel and Jan Hendrik de Boer in 1925. It involves the formation of the metal iodide, in this example vanadium(III) iodide, and the subsequent decomposition to yield pure metal.
