![]() ![]() No marketable antimony has been mined in the United States since 2001, when the Sunshine Silver Mine in Idaho, which produced antimony as a byproduct, closed. It is incorporated into adhesives, paints, plastics, rubber insulation, decorative foams, building materials and textiles, including upholstered furniture. Combined with halogenated particles, ATO suppresses, reduces or delays the spread of flame. The majority of antimony is consumed in the production of antimony trioxide (ATO), a compound used in flame-retardant materials. ![]() Eighty percent of the world’s antimony is produced from two types of deposits - carbonate replacement deposits and gold-antimony epithermal deposits. The principal ore minerals of antimony are stibnite and jamesonite, but it can also be a byproduct of certain other minerals. It occurs sparingly as a free element, but when it does it is usually in association with arsenic, bismuth or silver. Antimony tends to concentrate in sulfide ores along with copper, lead and silver. It is less abundant than tin, arsenic and the rare earths, but more so than bismuth, mercury and silver. Antimony is the 63rd-most abundant element in Earth’s crust. ![]() Compared with metals, antimony is a poor conductor of electricity and heat. In the early 18th century, Jöns Jakob Berzelius chose the periodic symbol for antimony (Sb) based on stibium, which is the Latin name for stibnite.Īntimony is nonmalleable, hard and brittle and can be crushed to a powder. The alchemist Basil Valentine is sometimes credited with “discovering” the element he described the extraction of metallic antimony from stibnite in his treatise “The Triumphal Chariot of Antimony,” published sometime between 13. Archaeological and historical studies indicate that antimony and its mineral sulfides have been used by humans for at least six millennia. Credit: PepperedJane.Īntimony is a lustrous silvery-white semimetal or metalloid. Reference is made to the relevant IMO publications of hazardous cargo.Stibnite is a principal ore of antimony. Resistant to attack by dilute acids, combustible, emits toxic fumes when heated or on contact with acids. It was formerly used in flash compositions, but its use was abandoned due to toxicity and sensitivity to static electricity.ĭamaged, or moist packing should not be accepted. It is also a component of modern safety matches. The "Dark Pyro" version is used in flash powders to increase their sensitivity and sharpen their report. Needle-like crystals, "Chinese Needle", are used in glitter compositions and white pyrotechnic stars. Stibnite is applied as tempering agent in alloys and in the paint industry and is poisonous.Īntimony trisulfide finds use in pyrotechnic compositions, namely in the glitter and fountain mixtures. Sometimes, Antimony Ore (stibnite) and Antimony Residue are offered as antimony. In the United States it is found in Arkansas, Idaho, Nevada, California, and Alaska. It occurs in Canada, Mexico, Peru, Japan, China, Germany, Romania, Italy, France, England, Algeria, and Kalimantan, Borneo. ![]() Small deposits of stibnite are common, but large deposits are rare. Stibnite occurs in hydrothermal deposits and is associated with realgar, orpiment, cinnabar, galena, pyrite, marcasite, arsenopyrite, cervantite, stibiconite, calcite, ankerite, barite and chalcedony. It is grey when fresh, but can turn superficially black due to oxidation in air. Stibnite has a structure similar to that of arsenic trisulfide, As2S3. As an antimony sulfide, it is potentially toxic and should be handled with care. The name is from the Greek stibi through the Latin stibium as the old name for the mineral and the element antimony. It is the most important source for the metalloid antimony. This soft grey material crystallizes in an orthorhombic space group. Stibnite, sometimes called antimonite, is a sulfide mineral with the formula Sb2S3. ![]()
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