Synthesis Of Copper Essay

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Native Copper and copper ore

Since copper is relatively unreactive lumps of pure copper can be found under the ground. 400 tones of pure copper was the most anyone has found but native copper usually isn’t mined as it is too hard to find and won’t make enough of a business. Copper is found all over the world but mostly in ores such as chalcopyrite, malachite and covellite. Chile, USA, Peru, China and Australia are all big contributors of copper.

Extraction process

There are ranges of different methods of extracting copper from different ores. The process below will examine a sequence of procedures to effectively extract as much copper from sulfide ores also known as Chalcopyrite (pyrites).

Mining

Sulfide ores contain roughly 34% of copper …show more content…

Source: http://www.essentialchemicalindustry.org/metals/copper.html

Previous page, Chalcopyrite ore (sulfide ore) that is made up of copper iron and sulfur (CuFeS2). Source:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Min_chalcopyrite.jpg …show more content…

A pure copper sheet (99.9% pure) is placed on the other side if the tank that acts as the cathode (the negatively charged electrode). When the power supply turns on, the copper sulfate poured in the tank acts as an electrical conductor that allows copper to transfer from the positively charged anode to the negatively charged electrode and copper particles slowly build up on the cathode (see diagram on page 5). About 14 days later the anode disappears since the copper was deposited on the cathodes making 99.9% copper. The impurities that were on the anode don’t become ions in the copper sulfate but rather fall as a slimy material that contains small amounts of gold and silver. These precious metals are extracted and result in a more effective way to utilise the byproducts rather then discarding them. Thanks to the fact that copper is highly unreactive the metal remains pure for a very long

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