Congratulations to ExpectToSelfRescue for the FTF!
First the junior high chemistry lesson:
Scandium is a chemical element with the symbol Sc and atomic number 21. A silvery-white metallic d-block element, it has historically been classified as a rare-earth element, together with yttrium and the lanthanides. It was discovered in 1879 by spectral analysis of the minerals euxenite and gadolinite from Scandinavia.
Lars Fredrik Nilson
Dmitri Mendeleev, who is referred to as the father of the periodic table, predicted the existence of an element ekaboron, with an atomic mass between 40 and 48 in 1869. Lars Fredrik Nilson and his team detected this element in the minerals euxenite and gadolinite in 1879. Nilson prepared 2 grams of scandium oxide of high purity. He named the element scandium, from the Latin Scandia meaning "Scandinavia". Nilson was apparently unaware of Mendeleev's prediction, but Per Teodor Cleve recognized the correspondence and notified Mendeleev.
Scandium is present in most of the deposits of rare-earth and uranium compounds, but it is extracted from these ores in only a few mines worldwide. Because of the low availability and the difficulties in the preparation of metallic scandium, which was first done in 1937, applications for scandium were not developed until the 1970s, when the positive effects of scandium on aluminium alloys were discovered, and its use in such alloys remains its only major application. The global trade of scandium oxide is 15–20 tonnes per year.
Scandium is a soft metal with a silvery appearance. It develops a slightly yellowish or pinkish cast when oxidized by air. It is susceptible to weathering and dissolves slowly in most dilute acids. It does not react with a 1:1 mixture of nitric acid (HNO3) and 48% hydrofluoric acid (HF), possibly due to the formation of an impermeable passive layer. Scandium turnings ignite in the air with a brilliant yellow flame to form scandium oxide.
Scandium metal
In Earth's crust, scandium is not rare. Estimates vary from 18 to 25 ppm, which is comparable to the abundance of cobalt (20–30 ppm). Scandium is only the 50th most common element on Earth (35th most abundant in the crust), but it is the 23rd most common element in the Sun. However, scandium is distributed sparsely and occurs in trace amounts in many minerals. Rare minerals from Scandinavia and Madagascar such as thortveitite, euxenite, and gadolinite are the only known concentrated sources of this element. Thortveitite can contain up to 45% of scandium in the form of scandium oxide.
The world production of scandium is in the order of 15-20 tonnes per year, in the form of scandium oxide. The demand is about 50% higher, and both the production and demand keep increasing. In 2003, only three mines produced scandium: the uranium and iron mines in Zhovti Vody in Ukraine, the rare-earth mines in Bayan Obo, China, and the apatite mines in the Kola peninsula, Russia; since then many other countries have built scandium-producing facilities, including 5 tonnes/year (7.5 tonnes/year Sc2O3) by Nickel Asia Corporation and Sumitomo Metal Mining in the Philippines. In the United States, NioCorp Development hopes to raise $1 billion toward opening a niobium mine at its Elk Creek site in southeast Nebraska which may be able to produce as much as 95 tonnes of scandium oxide annually. In each case, scandium is a byproduct of the extraction of other elements and is sold as scandium oxide.
To produce metallic scandium, the oxide is converted to scandium fluoride and then reduced with metallic calcium.
Madagascar and the Iveland-Evje region in Norway have the only deposits of minerals with high scandium content, thortveitite (Sc,Y)2(Si2O7) but these are not being exploited. The mineral kolbeckite ScPO4·2H2O has a very high scandium content but is not available in any larger deposits.
The absence of reliable, secure, stable, long-term production has limited the commercial applications of scandium. Despite this low level of use, scandium offers significant benefits. Particularly promising is the strengthening of aluminium alloys with as little as 0.5% scandium. Scandium-stabilized zirconia enjoys a growing market demand for use as a high-efficiency electrolyte in solid oxide fuel cells.
A scandium mining and production facility in Russia