About Palladium
About Palladium as a precious metal
Nickel palladium is used in the laboratory as a catalyst for hydrogenation reactions, particularly those involving aromatic substrates. It is prepared from nickel and palladium chloride by treatment with sulfamic acid at 200 °C. The crystalline product melts at 700 °C and has a density of 6.7 g/cm and has almost the same properties as palladium itself. The material can be prepared via several methods, including mixing dinitrosylmolybdenum hexachloride (NiMo(NO)) with finely divided PdCl in ethanol, or react NiMoCl with PdCl to produce fine-grained products which have been mechanically alloyed in powder metallurgy. Palladium prices are generally about 1% higher than those of platinum, although they are currently comparable.
Palladium is a precious metal and has recently been sold at prices around US$750 per ounce (US$30 per gram)
The price of palladium rose rapidly in the later quarter of 2008 to an 18-year high because of an increase in demand for palladium as a catalyst for manufacturing 'clean burning' cars that meet tighter emission regulations being introduced by several countries. Its price now is about US$950 per troy ounce (31 grams). Some auto makers have added 20 grams or more to their cars as part of the emissions control system; consequently, speculation is growing that palladium will become even more in demand: that as much as 350,000 ounces (10 t) of palladium could be bought by auto manufacturers next year. Several international mining companies have begun projects to increase production from current levels of less than 750,000 ounces (23 t).
Palladium is primarily used in the jewelry and electronics industries because it is softer, more ductile, and more easily worked or cast than platinum. Palladium has a deep lustrous silvery white metal color which resembles platinum; however, it is slower to tarnish for its likeliness to platinum. With a hardness comparable with that of iron, this softness makes it unsuitable for use in coins intended for circulation although its hardness does make it easier to work. Alloys of palladium are much more tarnish-resistant than pure silver, and can be used for jewelry without rhodium plating. Palladium is also a component in other alloys, such as those used in the batteries of hybrid electric vehicles.
In electronics, palladium is used as a contact material in many complex integrated circuits
Replacing less expensive copper. The contacts cannot corrode unless exposed to oxygen or water vapour at high temperature; therefore they do not need to be protected with a layer of lacquer or petroleum jelly which would otherwise need regular maintenance. This makes palladium-plated contacts an ideal choice for clean room environments where both corrosive elements and dust could cause problems to ordinary contact materials. Because of this property of being corrosion-free in air and water, palladium is used as a material for jewelry and coins, which are typically kept in pockets. Palladium has the lowest outgassing of any metal used by NASA, therefore it is frequently used in spacecraft applications requiring high vacuum conditions.
Mixed with rhodium (95% / 5%), palladium forms a bright white coating that resists tarnish on silver when fine silver or gold plating cannot be accomplished due to discolouration issues. It finds particular use for this purpose because palladium does not cause unwanted colour changes to darken the underlying coloured gems in rings whereas rhodine, another alloy ingredient commonly used to plate precious metals such as gold alloys or copper alloys, does. For this reason, when fine gold or silver manufactured goods cannot be plated with rhodium or other precious metal alloys due to the discolouration of other metals in the article, palladium is widely used instead for its bright white lustrous appearance.
Palladium can also be used as a substitute for platinum in manufacturing dental restorations such as crowns and bridges
It is also finding increased use in construction of artificial hip joints because of its high degree of corrosion resistance compared to traditional materials such as titanium (titanium weakens over time and therefore needs frequent replacement). Furthermore, palladium's malleability allows it to be easily formed into various shapes, which makes it useful for dentistry especially in the case of false teeth.
Palladium, always with 9% rhodium, is the alloy commonly used in catalytic converters for automobiles because palladium rapidly removes pollutants such as nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulfur dioxide (SO2), unburned hydrocarbons (HC) and carbon monoxide (CO) from automobile exhaust gases. For this purpose palladium is an essential ingredient in platinum group metal-based catalysts – when combined with a suitable 'activator' such as rhodium or gold it has been found than any other catalyst will have a much higher activity. The largest single use of palladium is therefore for pollution control equipment on cars. Palladium gauze is also widely used to purify hydrogen used as a fuel in the space industry.
Palladium is also found in jewelry, watches, electronics and dental implants
It is often seen in high-quality fountain pens due to its high degree of resistance to tarnish. Palladium has good thermal stability and is resistant to scratching or denting from some hard objects such as diamonds and quartz crystals. Therefore, it is widely used for the manufacture of luxury pans (due to its quick heating properties) and in laboratories, where lab glassware must be strong enough not to shatter when heated by Bunsen burners, but still retain delicate features including well-written numbers etched onto them with acid chemicals.
A palladium-anode catalyst plays an essential role in the production of nitric acid and ammonia, which in turn are used for the manufacture of fertilizers and chemicals. It is also used as a catalyst to desulfurize certain refinery streams, remove nitrogen from natural gas for pipeline transport, converting hydrocarbon wastes and contaminants into useful products such as gasoline or other fuels. Due to its inherent resistance to corrosion by hydrogen sulfide (H2S), it is widely used in waste water treatment plants where sulfuric acid is employed.
Palladium-in-ceramic membrane electrodes are an essential component of fuel cells because they allow oxygen from the air to be electrochemically converted into hydroxide ions while acting as a barrier that prevents carbon monoxide entering through electrolyte solutions and posing a risk of explosion.
Palladium is also a component in the manufacturing of superconductive magnets used by MRI scanners because it has a low neutron capture cross-section. The largest single use of palladium in industry involves its use to manufacture Automotive Catalytic Converters which are fitted into vehicle exhaust pipes to lessen the pollution levels emitted from vehicles (pollutants including Nitrogen Oxide, Carbon Monoxide and Hydrocarbons). Other uses include the manufacturing of dental restorations, laboratory glassware such as beakers and flasks etc., LCD televisions and monitors, hard disk drives for computers, surgical equipment such as bone replacement prostheses and hip joints among other things.
Palladium was discovered by William Hyde Wollaston in 1803 (at the same time as osmium and iridium) while he was studying whether the substances found in nitric acid were in fact a single element. He named it after the asteroid Pallas, which was discovered three years earlier, because of similarities between its characteristics and those of Palladium.
Palladium is a member of the platinum group metals (PGM). These heavy metals have similar properties to each other including their density, melting points, boiling points and thermal conductivity; they are also highly resistant to corrosion due to their inert nature while also being extremely stable against chemical attack – this means that these elements will not react with or dissolve in most acids and therefore all PGMs are considered 'noble' metals (this also means that they are resistant to corrosion by most of the chlorides, sulfates and other salts found in aquatic environments). The Platinum Group Metals are also resistant to oxidation (corroding) from exposure to air.
The noblest metal is platinum; palladium is the next-noblest and rhodium is 10% less noble than palladium. Palladium forms stable chemical compounds with all elements except oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur and fluorine (some PGM can form compounds with fluorine through oxidization or reduction of their oxides); it also reacts with oxygen at high temperatures (generating palladium(IV) oxide) but not at room temperature, so there is a clear demarcation between its chemistry as a metal and that of oxide.
Palladium does not react with methane at room temperature but it will react in the presence of boron to form palladium(II) boride crystals and with carbon monoxide, resulting in the formation of palladium(II) acetate as well as the formation of other Pd compounds with acetylides.
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