Salt is an inorganic compound that consists of sodium and chlorine ions. In crushed form is a white crystals of different sizes. In most cases, it has impurities that can change the color of the salt from light brown to gray.

Types of Salt

According to the genesis and method of obtaining table salt is divided into:

• Stone;
• Boiling out;
• Lake District;
• Basin.

Rock salt, or halite, is a mineral that consists of cubic crystals and is the main source of table salt, as well as a raw material for the production of chlorine, sodium hydroxide, and hydrochloric acid. Located in sedimentary rocks, the thickness of halite deposits reaches 350 meters. It differs from other types of salt in a relatively small amount of impurities.

Evaporated salt is obtained in the process of evaporation of natural brines, which are extracted from the bowels of the earth, or artificial brines, which are made by dissolving halite in water, which is pumped into the wells. After clarification of the brines, they are evaporated in a vacuum apparatus.

Lake, or self-salt, is mined from the bottom of the lakes. It is called sedimentary because it precipitates due to an excess of salt in the water. This type of table salt is characterized by high hygroscopicity and humidity.

Basin, or cage salt, is obtained from ocean or sea water, which is transferred to artificial, large in area, pools in the southern regions. Water evaporates, and salt precipitates.

According to the type of processing, table salt is divided into: finely crystalline, ground, unmilled and iodized; by quality: extra, top, first and second grade.

Deposits and Production

The natural reserves of table salt on Earth are almost inexhaustible.

The main types of salt deposits: strata of rock salt deposits, ocean, sea and lake waters, brines and groundwater, salt marshes. The largest Russian as well as Ukrainian deposits are Verkhnekamskoye, Seregovskoye, Astrakhan and Artyomovskoye.

In our time, table salt is mined by the mine method (the most common), crystallization, freezing, and evaporation.

The use of salt

The main importance of salt is in the food industry in the form of seasoning. In its pure form, it is used in metallurgy for the burning of ores and the purification of metals. It is used even in transport - sprinkling the bottom of wagons to protect coke or manganese ore during transportation. Salt is also used to process leather products in order to prevent their decay.

Mining and chemical raw materials in the form of salt belong to the non-metallic group of minerals. Rock salt is characterized by the lowest content of impurities, low humidity and the highest content of sodium chloride - up to 99%.

If we consider the breed in its pure form, then it is colorless and water-transparent. Unrefined salt is mixed with clay rocks, organic matter, iron oxide, respectively, and the color of the salt can be gray, brown, red and even blue. Easily soluble in water. In terms of transparency, halite has an amazingly weak glass luster. The world resources of rock salt are practically inexhaustible, since almost every country has deposits of this mineral.

Characteristic and types

Rock salt is formed as a result of compaction of halite sedimentary deposits that arose in past geological eras. It lies in large crystalline masses between rock formations. It is a natural crystalline mineral and environmentally friendly product. Rock salt contains a natural complex of biologically active macro and micronutrients. We can say with confidence that this type of salt is the most popular and most massive in sales. Subdivided into coarse and fine grinding. To increase iodine, iodized rock salt is produced.

Deposit and production

Solid salt deposits are found in many regions of the world, where they occur at a depth of several hundred to more than a thousand meters. Salt layers are chopped with special combines under the ground, then the rock is fed through conveyors to the surface of the earth. After that, falling on the mills crumbles to obtain particles (crystals) of various sizes.

They get more than in a hundred countries. The largest producer is the United States (21%), followed by Japan (14%). In Russia, the breed is mined in the Urals and Eastern Siberia. Ukraine and Belarus also have large reserves.

The use of rock salt

Rock salt is a storehouse of our planet. Most of the salt mined is used in the chemical, leather and food industries. Rock salt is an essential mineral for the human body. Humanity consumes about seven million tons of salt per year.

Widely used in medicine. There are many ways that are popular and contribute to the cure of many diseases with the use of rock salt.

The use of salt in modern fixtures is no longer considered a curiosity. The developers proved that under the influence of heat, the salt evaporates, which is what allows you to effectively ionize the air in the room.

Rock salt is a mineral of sedimentary origin, consisting of sodium chloride and impurities. The rock has another name - halite, which in everyday life is known as table salt.

In the conditions of the deposit, it is a stone that, after processing and purification, takes the usual form of a white powder. The rock has an ancient origin. The ancient Greeks associated its properties with the salty taste of sea water.

Main characteristics

The chemical formula of sodium chloride is NaCl, the compound contains 61% chlorine and 39% sodium.

In its pure form, a substance is found very rarely in vivo. When refined, rock salt can be transparent, opaque or white with a glass sheen. Depending on the constituents of additional impurities, the compound can be colored in:

The rock rock salt is quite fragile, absorbs moisture well and has a salty taste. The mineral quickly dissolves in water. The melting point is 800 degrees. During burning, the flame takes on an orange-yellow hue.

Rock salt looks like a cubic crystal or stalactite with a large granular structure.

Halite formation occurs during compaction of layers that were formed in past geological periods and are large massifs.

The origin of rock salt is conventionally divided into the following types:

Mineral deposits

Rock salt is a mineral of exogenous origin, whose deposits were formed many millions of years ago in a hot climate. Mineral deposits can form when drying out of salt lakes and shallow waters. A small amount of halite can form during volcanic activity or soil salinization in arid regions as a result of human activity.

With close proximity to groundwater with a high salt content, natural salinization of the soil can also occur. When moisture evaporates, a thin layer of rock forms on the soil surface.

For areas with high moisture evaporation and low water inflow, soil mineralization is characteristic. With high evaporation, compounds that form in different layers of the soil come to the surface. When salt crust forms on the upper soil layer, plant growth and the vital activity of living organisms ceases.

Currently, deposits are located in Russia in the Urals in the Solikamsk and Sol-Iletsk deposits, in Irkutsk, Orenburg, Arkhangelsk region, Volga region and Astrakhan region. In Ukraine, halite is mined in the Donetsk region and Transcarpathia. A significant amount of mineral is mined in Louisiana, Texas, Kansas, Oklahoma.

Mining methods

Mining on an industrial scale is carried out in several ways:

Due to the properties of rock salt, the use is not limited to eating. A man cannot do without table salt. Halite is in demand in technological processes in various industries. It is widely used not only in the food industry for the preservation of meat, fish and vegetables, since it is a cheap preservative.

In the chemical industry, the compound is necessary for the production of hydrochloric acid, which is in demand in various sectors of the economy.

In metallurgy, the mineral is used as a cooler in hardening, as well as in the production of a number of non-ferrous metal compounds. It is part of the electrolyte.

The pharmaceutical industry uses halite for the manufacture of drugs and solutions for injection.

In the leather industry, the compound is used as a tannin in the treatment of animal skins.

Healing properties

The sodium compound is part of the body’s internal environment, which ensures the normal functioning of the circulatory system, the conduction of impulses along nerve fibers.

Many peoples have a belief that if you pour salt with a cross before entering the house, it will protect against people with bad thoughts. It was highly appreciated by many peoples, it is no coincidence that spilled salt became a sign of trouble or quarrel. Halite is capable of reinforcing good intentions and returning evil multiplied by several times.

Mages and sorcerers consider conspiracies to love and luck using salt to be effective. A jar of salt can absorb other people's negative energy and protect the wearer from the evil eye and spoilage.

Or halite, the necessary and unique mineral in nature that people eat. It took him hundreds of years to become an indispensable seasoning in every kitchen.

Halite got its name from the union of two words: galla ("ink nut") and lithos ("stone"). In its pure form, halite contains many impurities and is not suitable for eating. Only after processing, ordinary rock salt is obtained from it.

Features of Origin

This interesting mineral belongs to sedimentary rocks and lies in natural brines, gradually crystallizing there. Its deposits have not yet been studied. Salt rocks are in different regions of our country. They are found in the craters of volcanoes. Natural halite in its natural state contains about 8% impurities, and its color varies from white, yellow, to blue and even red. Many minerals are covered with dense plaster skin.

Chemical composition

Halite consists of 39% sodium Na and 60.6% of. In addition to them, KCl, CaCl, MgCl₂ are present in the composition - their content depends on the field.

Varieties of mineral

In nature, it is customary to divide halite into certain categories:

• self-settling salt - a natural rock that is formed in evaporite deposits with fine-grained deposits of Druze;
• salt marsh - distributed in the steppe and desert regions, is a salt fading on the very surface of the soil in the form of plaque;

Salt flats Uyuni (Bolivia)

• volcanic halite - asbestos aggregates resulting from vulcanization, they are mined directly in the craters of volcanoes;
• rock salt - compaction of sedimentary accumulations of halite in rocks and their layers.

Different types of halite are formed as a result of the deposition of salts. It was previously believed that the mineral is obtained by precipitation of sea salt and evaporation of moisture from it on the surface. However, over time, this theory has lost its strength. The formation of halite rocks is influenced by certain physical properties, chemical compounds and geological features. To study the chemical properties of salt, you can conduct several simple experiments even at home.

Salt mascots

Salt for many centuries attributed miraculous properties. It was believed that a seemingly simple mineral composition could heal and expel negativity from life and home. And now salt is associated with many signs: to scatter - to a quarrel, pour to the ground in the form of a cross - to make a talisman against evil spirits, and also to identify damage. Such amulets needed to be made on certain days indicated in the old ritual books.

Royal Salt Mines in Wieliczka (Poland)

Healing properties

In addition to its magical properties, halite is also known as a healing mineral. It is an excellent cold remedy. They gargle, nose with tonsillitis and runny nose. It copes with pharyngitis, sinusitis, toothache and tonsillitis.

Making halitic salt for rinsing is very simple: you need to take 1 tablespoon of salt and dilute it in a glass of warm boiled (200 ml). You can add a few drops to the glass. Stir until crystals are dissolved. Such a tool helps well with purulent processes, inflammatory and infectious formations. Radiculitis, sinusitis are heated with salt heated in a bag. But this must be done very carefully. The treatment of bronchitis and pneumonia with air-saturated halite ions has effectively proven itself. This will require special equipment.

Application

The widespread use of halite is caused by the availability of extraction of this mineral. It is mainly used in the food industry. Before packing, the natural mineral is cleaned of impurities. Sometimes iodine is added there or additional crushing is carried out, as a result, the Extra salt is obtained.

In the chemical industry, halite is used to remove sodium and chlorine. As a result, soda, concentrated alkalis, and even hydrochloric acid, known to us, are obtained. Halite is often included in paper and glass. By the way, in the lenses a halite single-crystal film serves as an additional layer of strength.

Concentrated halite clean the boilers of water heating units from scale. Halite is a good way to combat frostbite on the roads. Salt sculptures, lamps, home furnishings, amulets are made of pure mineral rocks. But this mineral is quite fragile, it is easy to damage. Therefore, halite should be used only for its intended purpose.

For many millennia, table salt was used almost exclusively in food, to protect foods from spoilage, and for salting vegetables.

Small amounts were used to make leathers. To obtain rawhide, loosened skins are treated with a mixture of alum and table salt; salt enhances the tanning effect of alum and dehydrates the skin fibers, thereby preventing them from sticking during drying. For a long time, dyes used table salt for the preparation of mordants, and soap-makers - for salting out soap.

This went on until almost the end of the 18th century, until the development of weaving and spinning, the production of cheap fabrics from cotton, required soda and chlorine. The most suitable raw material for obtaining these products was table salt. In addition, as scientists have established, it could be used in the preparation of glauber's salt and hydrochloric acid, alkalis, paints and many hundreds of other chemical products. For example, canning of leathers also cannot do without the use of table salt: washed skins are dipped in a concentrated salt solution to prevent rotting.

Like salt, people met soda in ancient times. Egyptian craftsmen widely used soda for making glass and degreasing wool, and used it in medicine.

Until the beginning of the XIX century. soda was obtained from the soda lakes of Egypt and some other countries, as well as from plant ash containing sodium salts in their tissues. In the Middle Ages and later, the Spanish barilla soda, which was extracted from a specially bred salsol plant, was famous. In France, the source of plant soda was the Selicore plant, in Scotland it was extracted from algae ash. In the 40s of the XVIII century. French chemist Duhamel de Monceau made an important discovery: he proved that table salt and soda have the same basis - sodium. At that time, sodium was not yet obtained in its free form, and scientists thought that soda was not a chemical compound, but an element, like sulfur or phosphorus.

The discovery of Duhamel prompted scientists to use salt for soda. After all, if nature turns the salt contained in the soil into soda of soda plants, then why can not a person carry out such a metamorphosis in the laboratory?

In 1775, the French Academy of Sciences announced a prize of 12,000 francs for the best way to produce artificial soda. Many methods were proposed for producing soda, but all of them were expensive, unprofitable, and chemists continued to find new ways to produce artificial soda.

In 1789, under the blows of the victorious revolution in France, the absolutist monarchy collapsed. From the very first days of the birth of the new system, the French people had to defend the gains of the revolution with arms in their hands. Surrounded by a ring of hostile states, the young republic was in dire need of ammunition. The base of black powder, which was then used, was saltpeter; potash was needed to produce it.

In 1794, a government message appeared in Paris newspapers: “The republic needs potash for the manufacture of nitrate, and soda could in many cases replace potash; nature gives us immeasurable quantities of table salt from which soda can be extracted. " Many famous French chemists responded to this call - more than 30 proposals were received. The Leblanc method was unanimously recognized as the best.

A mixture of glauber's salt, limestone (or chalk) and coal is heated in large brick ovens. The mass melts with thorough mixing with iron pokers or scrapers. Blue lights appear on the surface of the molten mass, and when they disappear, the alloy is removed from the furnace.

So as a result of the reaction between the constituent parts of the mixture, soda was born. Glauber's salt was obtained by decomposing sodium chloride with sulfuric acid.

LeBlanc’s invention freed France from foreign dependence, but the fate of the scientist himself was very tragic: in 1806, while in deep poverty, he committed suicide. A talented inventor and scientist could not overcome the soullessness and greed of a capitalist society.

Only some time after the death of LeBlanc, sulfur production by his method began to develop rapidly. In many countries of Europe, soda plants appeared, producing hundreds of thousands of tons of soda and other chemical products. However, the LeBlanc method had many shortcomings. The most significant of them is the abundance of waste in the form of hydrogen chloride and calcium sulphide.

In the 30s of the last century, a new, simpler and more profitable way was found to get soda from table salt, but almost 60 years passed before it became widespread. The method is as follows. The concentrated sodium chloride solution is saturated with ammonia, and then carbon dioxide is passed through the brine under pressure, a product of calcining limestone in furnaces. Ammonia interacts with carbon dioxide and water to form ammonium bicarbonate. The latter reacts in an exchange decomposition with sodium chloride and the resulting bicarbonate soda precipitates, which is filtered off and calcined. The result is soda ash, carbon dioxide and water. The gas is again used to saturate the brine. Ammonia is isolated from a solution containing ammonium chloride by heating the solution with lime obtained by calcining limestone. Ammonia is also returned to the production cycle.

Thus, with the ammonia method of producing soda, the amount of waste is much less than with the Leblanc method. Waste is only calcium chloride, which finds some industrial use: calcium chloride solutions are watered with dust solutions, it is introduced into the composition of cooling mixtures, it is used for drying gases, dehydrating ether and other organic liquids, it is used in medicine.

In Russia, the scale of soda production began to expand only in the 80s of the last century, although small soda plants appeared already in the 60s. In 1864, M.P. Prang built a soda factory in Barnaul; at the factory according to the Leblanc method, soda was made from natural glauber salt. The latter was mined from Marmyshansk lakes located in the Kulundinskaya steppe 200 km from Barnaul.

The problem of obtaining soda artificially interested Russian scientists in the XVIII century. Academician Kirill Laxman in 1764, 11 years earlier than Malerba and 27 years earlier than Leblanc, received soda from natural Glauber's salt. He was the first to propose replacing soda and potash with this salt in the production of glass.

At the same time, Russian scientists studied the possibility of industrial use of table salt. Many of them - Kireyevsky, Krupsky, Mendeleev and others - strongly advocated the creation of domestic production of soda. Moreover, even then, it was associated with the production of many important chemical products: sulfuric and hydrochloric acids, sodium sulfate, bertholite, chlorine. Mendeleev wrote that "now it is impossible to imagine the development of industry without the consumption of soda." The appearance on the market of domestic soda, in his opinion, would also provide services to agriculture. Replacing potash with soda in many industries would help conserve forests.

However, the high excise on table salt prevented the successful development of soda production in Russia. Despite the insistent demands of scientists and industrialists, the tsarist government for a long time did not want to remove the excise tax on salt. Only in 1881 were the bonds broken, fettering the emergence of large soda production, and the results were not slow to affect. Two years later, the first large soda factory in the Northern Urals in Berezniki was built, built by the merchant Lyubimov together with the Belgian company Solve. In the 35 years since the foundation of this plant until the Great October Revolution, 878 thousand g of soda ash were produced at the Berezniki plant.

During the years of Soviet power, the Bereznikovsky plant was reconstructed and expanded, soda production increased several times in comparison with the pre-revolutionary one. Most recently, soda, as in Tsarist times, was obtained from natural salt brine pumped out of the earth’s bowels at the plant. Now it is produced from artificial brine, obtained by dissolving potassium waste. This significantly reduced the cost of soda.

Nowadays, a number of large soda plants operate in the Soviet Union.

The use of soda in the national economy has expanded tremendously. Soda is needed not only for soapmakers, glassmakers and textile workers, but also for metallurgists (separation and purification of non-ferrous metals, removal of sulfur from cast iron), dyers, furriers and food service workers (making confectionery and mineral waters, clarification of vegetable oils). A lot of soda is spent on softening the water used in factories, in steam boilers of steam locomotives and power plants. Soda serves as a raw material for many chemical products (magnesia, sodium sulfate, sodium fluoride, etc.).

If all the table salt processed in a year around the world for soda was loaded into freight cars, then the train would stretch from Moscow to Vladivostok.

Most of the salt consumed by the chemical industry goes to the production of soda, caustic soda (caustic soda) and chlorine. Back in 1883, Russian scientists Lidov and Tikhomirov developed an industrial method for producing caustic soda from sodium chloride by electrolysis of its aqueous solutions. In addition to this, along with caustic soda, chlorine is also obtained. Both of these products are very necessary for many sectors of the economy.

In recent years, salt has not only become a source of chemicals, medicines, fertilizers, explosives, but also acquired some new “professions”. It is successfully used for extinguishing burning soot, for hardening steel products. It is used to accelerate the melting of ice, for the preparation of cooling mixtures used in refrigerators. Salt is needed to clarify turpentine and rosin, in the production of higher grades of glove huskies. In the tobacco industry, some varieties of tobacco are treated with salt to improve its quality.

When constructing artificial ponds, usually the walls and bottom of ponds are protected with clay, lined with concrete or asphalt. However, clay does not completely retain water, and concrete and asphalt are too expensive. It was necessary to find some cheap and at the same time quite waterproof material. Academician A.N. Sokolovsky became interested in this problem several years ago. Studying the properties of soils, he noticed that the soil, saturated with salt, does not pass water. Salt fills the pores of the soil, makes it waterproof. Such soils are called salt marshes, often their surface is covered with a thin snow-white coating of salt.

In the steppes of Kazakhstan and Crimea, in the Caspian littoral and Dnieper regions, small lakes are formed on salt marshes in early spring, which sometimes do not dry out until the end of summer. Sokolovsky’s laboratory made such an artificial “lake”. Soil was poured onto a thin sieve inserted into the funnel and washed with a solution of sodium chloride; an artificial salt marsh was formed. But in natural conditions the saline is watered by rains, washed by melt spring water. Therefore, fresh water was poured through the funnel. At first, it seeped fairly quickly - about 30-50 drops per minute, but gradually the drops fell less and less, and finally they were gone. Water does not seep through a thin layer of earth - only 3-4 mm, turned into a solonetz.

Consequently, if you cover the walls and bottom of any reservoir with a thin layer of soil saturated with salt, there will be no leakage. Sokolovsky’s experiments on salinization of irrigation canals on some Volga collective farms were successful — water leakage completely stopped.

The salinization of reservoirs begins to be widely used in Ukraine, in the Lower Volga region, and Uzbekistan. Salt successfully replaces asphalt and concrete. In addition, soil treatment with salt solution is much cheaper than coating with asphalt or concrete. After all, for salinization, you can take dirty, non-edible salt, waste from some chemical plants.

Invaluable services are provided by salt to builders. For example, in winter, during the construction of the Bratsk hydroelectric power station, clay soil froze and turned into hard stone. Even excavators and bulldozers could not cope with frozen ground. The Leningrad Civil Engineering Institute has developed a way to protect clay soil from freezing. Plots of land on which ditches or pits should be dug in winter are densely sprinkled with salt, and then even in the most severe frosts the earth remains soft.

Salt is a substance of inexhaustible possibilities. Already, there are more than a thousand different ways of its application. And how many of them, and what unexpected ones, will appear in our atomic age! ..