Introductory Chapter: An Insight into Fascinating Potential of Magnesium

Abstract

The name, magnesium (Mg), was derived from an ancient city in Greece called “Magnesia”where magnesium carbonate was first discovered. It was first isolated in its elemental form by English chemist Sir Humphry Davy in 1808 [1]. In the earth’s crust, magnesium is the sixth most abundant element and occurs in over 60 different minerals with at least 20% of Mg within them. Most commercially important of these minerals include dolomite, magnesite, brucite, and carnallite. Principally, magnesium is extracted from its minerals using a thermal reduction process [2]. Magnesium is also the third most abundant metal ion in seawater. Despite magnesium being only 0.13% of seawater, seawater remains an almost inexhaustible source for its extraction. Magnesium is extracted from seawater or brine using the electrolytic process of magnesium chloride [2]. Of the two extraction processes, the thermal reduction process is known to yield a higher purity of 99.99%, while the electrolysis process can achieve purity limited to 99.8%. Until the 1990s, the USA and Canada dominated the production of magnesium; however, the industrial revolution in China in the late 1990s turned the tables for magnesium production due to its lower operational (energy and labor) costs. It is estimated that 85% of the global magnesium production is currently done by China, and most of the remainder is produced by Russia, Turkey, Spain, Austria, etc. [3].