In an interview to CentralAsia.news, a well-known Turkmen scientist and observer Allaberdi Ilyasov outlined the positive aspects of the chemical substance Neon. He discovered both the economic and industrial significance of the element.
Potential source of income
Turkmenistan, based on the innovative technologies of its chemical industry, can produce neon — the main and necessary component for the production of chips — integrated microcircuits which have the size of a tiny grain of rice.
Neon is an inert monatomic, colorless and odorless gas. It practically does not enter into an active chemical reaction with anything. But at the same time, the element has a high electrical conductivity, and turns bright red when a current is passed through it. Neon is the fifth most abundant element in the universe after hydrogen, helium, oxygen and carbon.
Sources of production
The only source of neon production is air. It is separated using low-temperature rectification technology. As a result, its lightest components, namely Ne and He, are separated from oxygen. The resulting product may contain as little as 10 percent of the neon-helium mixture, while the rest of the mass of matter is nitrogen and hydrogen.
The next task is to clean the neon-helium mixture as much as possible from foreign impurities using adsorption and condensation methods, ensuring its maximum purity. For this, industrial equipment is used. The equipment makes it possible to remove the chemical components H and N from the product. Hydrogen is burned out of the resulting mixture in special furnaces, and nitrogen is removed using low-temperature reflux condensers and cryogenic adsorbers.
As a result, it is possible to obtain the so-called raw neon, that is, a neon-helium mixture, which contains about 50-75 percent of pure Ne. In addition, the product contains approximately three times less helium and only up to two percent of hydrogen.
For industrial purposes, neon is isolated from the air as a by-product during the separation of liquid nitrogen and oxygen from the air in two ways: adsorption or condensation.
Product price
In most cases, a raw gas product is sufficient for industrial applications, but often it may be required in an especially pure form. To obtain it, it is necessary to use industrial installations that use adsorption or condensation methods in their work.
For example, in the case of condensation, the substance is artificially frozen using liquid nitrogen brought to a boil under vacuum. Pure neon gas must contain at least 99.888 percent of pure substance according to the standard. It is non-toxic and completely inert.
But for some areas of activity, even deeper, complex purification may be required. The goal is to obtain Ne with a purity of up to 99.99 percent and higher. The areas for the production of purified neon are quite limited, it is more a laboratory or a full-fledged plant. So, for example, recently, a technology was developed and a plant for the production of high-purity neon was created at Bauman Moscow State Technical University (Russian Federation) within four months.
Naturally, the cost of a gas product that has undergone deep and comprehensive cleaning is higher. Today the price of neon is 2,500 US dollars per cubic meter. This means that the production of pure neon can provide tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars of technological exports per year in the shortest possible time.
The history
In December 1910, French inventor Georges Claude made a gas discharge lamp filled with neon. Neon was discovered in June 1898 by the Scottish chemist William Ramsay and the English chemist Maurice Travers. They isolated this inert gas «by elimination» after oxygen, nitrogen, and the increasingly heavier components of air were liquefied. The element was given the uncomplicated name «neon», which means «new» in Greek.
Use of neon
Neon is widely used in various areas of human activity. Mixed with helium, this chemical element is used as a specialized working medium for some types of gas lasers. But mixtures of Ne and N are indispensable in the production of outdoor lighting and for the creation of advertising and signage.
Neon has found wide application in the industrial field. This element acts as a coolant in cryogenic installations. Liquid neon is ideal for creating temperatures for storing rocket fuel or for simulating space conditions.
Multifaceted directions
Mixing neon with helium creates a mixture that is suitable for the breathing of people working in high pressure conditions. For example, oceanauts and divers.
Also, light neon-helium air helps to alleviate the condition of patients who suffer from problems with the respiratory tract. Already today, humanity is faced with the fact that the level of demand for neon and neon-helium mixtures exceeds the amount produced, which may lead to a certain shortage in the near future.
Liquid neon acts as an effective refrigerant, making it indispensable in the operation of some types of cryogenic installations. For example, with the help of such installations today they provide conditions for storing rocket fuel.
Neon is used in excimer lasers in photolithographic installations (scanners) as a consumable material. Without this gas, it is simply impossible to organize the production of semiconductors. Thus, the scope of Ne is developing every day, and the volume of its consumption is also growing.
