Magnesium From Seawater

I hope it works.

It looks like it's still theoretical at this point.

PNNL will draw on its expertise in catalyst development, molecular simulation, powder metallurgy and metal-organic chemistry for the project. Detailed computer modeling and follow-up lab tests will be used to pinpoint the catalyst's specific chemical makeup.

Very interesting points. I just got off the telephone this afternoon with the CEO of Global Seawater Technologies, and we had an interesting conversation. He says they are already building a plant in Mexico (since you can't move fast on anything in the states these days). They are plenty thirsty in Mexico, and economical drinking water is even more important there.

I am interested in the magnesium for other reasons than just cheaper alloys.

So they're ready to roll?

Sounds good.

On a side note: I think the decision to move to Mexico was a good one. They're economy is moving at a much better clip than ours, and the government is happy to see manufacturers move in.

The new superpower in the western hemisphere?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/22/world/americas/for-migrants-new-land-of-opportunity-is-mexico.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

And a separate process issue about magnesium fracturization.......

In the dairy industry, they have been pulling all types of minerals from some of the by-products of whey..... by Reverse Osmosis - R.O. Proteins, calcium.....

I was at a customer that doing a large expansion where I was working on another project and was I was talking to one of the process engineers and he was giving me a hard time, that they are pulling components from milk that no one else was doing... Then he went on to say he could not tell me what it was because it was 'top secret'

Well there are only so many components in milk and I knew what was commercially and was currently being separated, I also knew what the next abundant item in milk that wasn't being separated, and I ask him, "So what are you going to do with all that Magnesium?"

His response was....

Here is the list of components in milk

Looks like normally magnesium is relatively low abundance in milk. Must be higher in milk serum concentrates, once other items are drawn off. That means you guys are down to pulling everything out of the milk, but the moo.

It's volume......... And where Elise ..... I mean else is it going to go.....

If it is low in milk, then it is lower in seawater...

low or even high for than matter is not really a quanitative term.... so we're safe.

Uh, I don't think so. Magnesium is the third element of abundance in seawater (besides hydrogen and oxygen), after sodium and chloride. A 2 million gpd water purification plant that also mines the water for the minerals, will produce somewhere near a truckload per day of magnesium sulfate, or magnesium chloride.

Ya magnesium, good for the Jimmy Leg....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnesium

nice if got the grant but I don't expect a flood of metal on the market tomorrow.......or next month....or next year

I used to work at PNNL, but it was quite a while ago. I didn't recognize any names, but CR4 Mikerho works there now. Maybe we can hear some inside news?

Do tell. I am really interested in learning how they will be able to lower the process temperature by so much.

Lowering the boiling point with vacuum?

Although, that's not new.

I somewhat doubt thats the approach, but I'd also like to know how they're doing it, especially on a large scale and saving energy at the same time, sounds like magic

I spoke at length on the telephone yesterday with their lead engineer. This discussion was absolutely enlightening. They are using hydraulic leveraging to pump and pressurize the seawater without the use of electric motors. Heat from the solar ponds drives the process with water coming from the pond that is above the normal boiling point of pure water at sea level. The working fluid in the opposing piston engines is subjected alternately to this heat, and a cool stream, thereby producing active expansion of the fluid, and contraction. The pistons drive a high pressure piston to pressurize hydraulic fluid. A hydraulic motor powers each pump employed. A back-pressure turbine captures the hydraulic energy of the final RO concentrate.

What is more amazing is that they capture the magnesium and calcium separately prior to the RO unit (yes, softened seawater). From my conversations with personnel at Global Seawater Technologies, it is apparently they have their stuff together in a tight wad. Yes, they actually do plan to produce magnesium metal on site at a future date. They produce copious amounts of fresh water, various pure salts, and net energy, by utilizing saline gradient solar ponds, geothermal wells, and some real engineering smarts.

interesting, almost sounds like an inspiration spawned from a Sterling engine!

I would say it is very closely related to a Stirling or Ericcson (SP?) engine. Can anyone say supercritical carbon dioxide? A slight difference here is these gents apparently are capturing power from expansion AND from the contraction of the working fluid. I am so excited by this whole project it makes me have more optimism for the hope of humanity into the future.

Not entirely sure, but I think the magnesium collects at cathode at liquid magnesium, the boiling point of magnesium (normal) is 1363 K (1090 C). What I suspect is that they are utilizing a mineral that (1) provides a much lower eutectic melt than pure MgCl2, and (2) does not result in excessive by-products (or troublesome ones) at the electrodes. Obviously high rates of any by-product would greatly lower the efficiency of the process and increase the cost, rather than lower.

Maybe there's a small clue here:

http://www.thewaterclinic.com/products-soft.php

http://www.ianrpubs.unl.edu/live/g1491/build/g1491.pdf

More clues...

http://www.seafriends.org.nz/oceano/seawater.htm#composition

http://silver.atomistry.com/

Thanks for the links. I was already aware of water softening with ion exchange, but there is a problem: the saltier the water, the harder is it to remove the hardness ions by ion exchange. I suspect they are using a different resin type (weak acid cation exchange resin, for example), but this also requires fairly extreme measures to regenerate. So you think they are using silver ion? No way, the silver would plate out on the cathode before the magnesium.

I completely blew it with the silver connection. I misread the chart.

But with the water softener connection, I was thinking that they may have come up with a way to attract only the magnesium.

Perhaps I misled the audience. The GSWT crew intends to mine EVERY recoverable salt it can from the sea. This includes calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium for starters, and there might even be others. I am assuming they will be using some type of advanced resin technology, but I am not so sure that similar schemes could be employed to pre-soften the seawater efficiently by the use of suitable nanofilter elements that reject Alkaline Earth ions and pass alkali metal ions. Remains to be seen.

The high temperature of electrolysis shows that they are electrolyzing the solid salts from sea water, under molten conditions. As obtained, apparently it requires 900C to be molten. The addition of certain materials can suppress the melting point to lower temperatures, without interfering with the process. For instance in the electrolysis of alumina (M.Pt. = 2,000C) cryolite is added to lower the molten temperature to about 950C. My guess is that they have discovered something which lowers the M.Pt. from 900C to 300C.

Probably a good guess! Cheers. The real question: what is IT? Anything with oxygen will reduce electrolysis efficiency - that is at least MgO will mess things up in a MgCl2 electrolysis. The PNNL guys have apparently figured out how to lower the net energy input to production of 1 Kg of Magnesium metal by 50%.

Maybe it's some sort of molecular bonding instead of melting pt.....

Nah. Solid state diffusion to the electrodes would be disastrously slow. I am pretty sure the medium must be in a liquid state (or maybe maybe in a plasma state i.e. ionized matter) and for this to happen at 300 C there must be an innocuous compound they can dissolve in the MgCl₂ that will produce a sharply dipped eutectic point. But for the life of me, I cannot figure it out. That's probably why these guys have the patents, huh.