Key Figures of the Aluminium Industry
In 1825, Ørsted produced the first metallic aluminium. By passing chlorine through a heated mixture of alumina and coal, he produced waterless aluminium chloride. By heating this with potassium amalgam, mercury evaporated and the sought metal was produced.
Øersted was born in Rudkobing, a small Danish town, into a family of apothecary. From childhood, he was eager to learn and enrolled at Copenhagen University without completing secondary education. He studied various subjects including physics, medicine and philology. In 1806, he became a professor of physics in his alma-mater. From 1815 he was Secretary of the Danish Royal Society. During the winter of 1819-1820, he made his most importnat discovery, revealing a connection between magnetism and electricity. For this reason he was chosen to join the London Royal Society and the Paris Academy. In addition, he studied the thermoelectric effect, invented the piezometer, and carried out research in the field of molecular physics.
In 1808, Davy electrolyzed alumina by trying to extract an unknown metal which he was sure existed. These attempts failed, but the scientist produced an aluminium-iron alloy. It was he who named the metal aluminium. ‘If I was lucky to extract the metallic substance I was searching for I would propose a name for it — aluminium,’ wrote Davy.
Davy was born into a poor family, but due to his talent, persistence and industriousness he managed to turn his favorite subject, chemistry, into his profession. At the beginning of the 19th century, working at the Royal Institute, he used electrolysis to produce six metals in free form: potassium, sodium, barium, calcium and strontium. He produced boron out of boric acid, which turned the traditional notions of that time upside-down. In 1818, he discovered lithium. He also developed the hydrogen theory of acids.
In 1827, Wöhler decided to repeat Oersted’s experiment, but his attempt failed. After that, the researcher developed a more perfected method and produced aluminium by displacing it with metallic potassium from the chloride. This product was cleaner than that of the Danish chemist. For twenty years, Wöhler gave up experiments with this new metal, but on using the metal again in experiments, he was the first to describe its properties and produce an ingot.
Wöhler was born in Eschersheim into the family of a prosperous merchant. He graduated from Marburg University, where he received a doctorate in medicine in 1823. However, his real vocation was chemistry. He separated pure amorphous boron, beryllium and yttrium, produced many compounds for the first time, and found a new method to produce white phosphor which is still used today. However, his most important achievement is considered to be the synthesis of urea from ammonium cyanate solution (the production of an organic substance from a non-organic one).
Saint-Claire Deville continued Wöhler’s research and in 1854 he developed an industrial method to produce aluminium. Instead of using metallic potassium, he applied cheaper metallic sodium in order to displace aluminium. By the following year, he had obtained enough aluminium to cast a 7 kg/15 lb block. In 1856, he applied electrolysis to molten sodium-aluminium chloride to produce aluminium. From 1855 to 1890, 200 tonnes of light aluminium had been produced using Saint-Claire Deville’s method. The process was subsequently used in commercial aluminium production and the price of the metal quickly fell to one-hundredth of its former price. However, it was still too expensive to be used in the mass production of consumption goods.
Saint-Claire Deville was born on the Virgin Islands into a French family. He studied science and medicine in France, becoming a professor at the High School in Paris and afterwards at the Sorbonne. In 1861, he became a member of the Paris Academy of Sciences in the Mineralogy Department. Saint-Claire Deville’s most significant achievement is the implementation of the dissociation doctrine.
In 1865, Beketov invented a ‘chemical’ method to produce aluminium. In studying the dependence of chemical reactions on the condition of reagents, external conditions, chemical affinity and properties defining such affinity, Beketov showed that magnesium displaced aluminium from molten cryolite. 23 years later, this reaction was applied to produce aluminium at a smelter in Gmelingen, Germany.
Beketov was born in the Penza Province into the family of a landowner. He studied at Saint Petersburg and Kazan Universities. He was professor at Saint Petersburg and Kharkov Universities. He also worked in a chemical laboratory at the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In addition to his academic and scientific activities, Beketov made a considerable contribution to the social and enlightenment movements. He was founder of the public library in Kharkov, the Society for Aid to Indigent Students, and the Literacy Dissemination Society. He was President of the Russian Physical and Chemical Society.
At the end of 1880s and beginning of the 1890s, Bayer had developed an efficient method to provide alumina to the textile industry, which used it as a fixing agent in the dyeing of cotton. The method consisted of treating bauxite with alkaline solution and then decomposing the sodium aluminate. Bayer’s technology is still applied at modern enterprises.
Bayer was born in Belts. In Heidelberg, at the age of 24, he submitted his doctoral thesis, ‘The Chemistry of Indium.’ He subsequently became a professor in Brno. When he was 38, he moved to Russia and worked at the Tentelev chemical plant (after the revolution this was renamed the Krasny Khimik Plant). Having moved from St. Petersburg to Elabuga, he worked at the Bondyuzhny Plant, where an alumina production studio was been constructed for him.
(1860-1936), a Russian
chemist-technologist.
(1863-1914), an American engineer and chemist.
(1863–1914), a French chemical engineer.
Yakovkin invented a new technology to produce alumina out of poor quality Tikhvin bauxites. The method, which consisted of baking bauxite with limestone and soda, lasted until the beginning of the 1930s. Subsequently, the method was applied at the Volkhov Aluminium Smelter.
Yakovkin devoted himself to the theory of solutions. From 1899 to 1936, he worked at the St. Petersburg (Leningrad) Technological University. He reformed the teaching of chemistry and chemical technology. In 1919, he established the Russian State Institute of Applied Chemistry, where he worked on a part-time basis until the end of his life. In 1924, he became an associate member of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
From 1888, Hall worked for the Reduction Company of Pittsburgh, which constructed the first large aluminium smelter. Based on this structure, the Aluminium Company of America was established, which later became Alcoa. Hall was its President until the end of his life. He obtained 22 other patents, mainly connected with aluminium production.
Hall was born into a clerical family in Thompson. During his studies at Oberlin College, he became interested in chemical experiments and focused his research efforts on the methods of aluminium production. In 1886, he produced the first aluminium ingots by passing an electric current through a bath of alumina dissolved in cryolite. The method was revolutionary. At the same time Paul Heroult, working in France, came to a similar result. After a lawsuit which lasted many years, Hall’s rights were recognized in America and Heroult’s were recognized in Europe. This new method ensured an increase of aluminium production up to 8 ,000 tones per annum by 1900.
Heroult invented a method for industrial aluminium production through the electrolysis of alumina molten in cryolite in 1886, the same year as Charles Hall.
Heroult was born in Thury-Harcourt and was educated at Mining School in Paris. An electric steel furnace designed by him in 1889, became popular around the world and was named after him.
(1864 -1934), a Russian
chemist-technologist.
(1876-1955), a Norwegian engineer and inventor.
(1904-1990), the Minister of the USSR
Non-Ferrous Metallurgy.
Fedotiev concentrated his efforts on producing a technology for industrial aluminium production through the electrolysis of cryolite and alumina melts. The first soviet aluminium was produced under his guidance at Krasny Vyborzhets Smelter in 1929.
He was born in Blagoveshchensk in 1864. In 1888, he graduated from the St. Petersburg Technology Institute and subsequently worked as a chemist at a number of soviet plants. In 1904, he became a professor at the St. Petersburg (Leningrad) Polytechnic Institute. He dealt with technologies for production of mineral substances, technical electrochemistry and electrometallurgy. In 1933, he was elected associate member of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Søderberg was born in Sweden. His family moved to Norway when he was one and half years old. When he was young, his dream was to be a violin maker and to become the new Stradivarius, but, as this profession didn’t guarantee a stable income, he became an engineer in Hanover. In 1913, he was invited to Elektrokemisk, which was later renamed, Elkem.
There, self-baking anode cells were developed. In Norway during the First World War, there was a lack of electrodes for the metallurgic industry, as before the war they had been imported from Germany. This called for the invention of a new production method. Søderberg performed his research together with two other engineers at the company, Mathias Sam and Jens Westly. By 1919, their attempts had succeeded.
Lomako is known as the ‘father of the Russian aluminium industry.’ The main aluminium smelters in the country were established under his management.
He was born into a peasant family. In 1932, he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Non-Ferrous Metals and Aurum. At the end of the 1930s, he became a Director at the Kolchuginsk Non-Ferrous Metals Processing Plant and in 1940 he was appointed the People’s Commissar of the Non-Ferrous Metallurgy. From 1946 to 1986 (with insignificant interruptions) he was the Minister of the USSR Non-Ferrous Metallurgy. During his time in office this industry became the world leader.
