Where does the pure element, zinc come from? How is it collected and purified?
Most of it comes from mines in China, Australia and Peru. It’s mined as an ore called sphalerite, containing mainly zinc sulphide. The sulphide is seperated from most of the impurities by mechanical means. Then it’s converted to the oxide by heating. The zinc oxide is then dissolved in sulphuric acid, which can be electrolysed to produce pure zinc metal. Alternatively, the oxide is heated to about 1000oC with carbon/carbon monoxide, which converts it directly into the metal.
