Tantalum industrial applications and uses

Tantalum’s good thermal conductivity (57.5 W.m^–1.K^–1 at 20°C) gives a suitable construction material when corrosion resistance has to be combined with good heat transfer conduction. Thus tantalum is widely used for heat-transfer devices working in concentrated acidic media (e.g., plate and tube heat exchangers, spiral coil, U-tubes, spargers, bayonet heaters and thermowells, condensers, boilers, etc.). 

Its good Young’s modulus (185 GPa) and yield tensile strength (172 MPa) allow the use of tantalum when good mechanical strength is required for a device (e.g., rupture disks, impellers, column, and reactor vessels). For example, some distillation columns for concentration of hydrochloric acid or high-boiling-point organic acids require tower internals made of solid tantalum (e.g., Ta-Intalox®).

Chemicalprocess industries (CPI) equipment

Close examination of tantalum properties reveals that, besides its excellent corrosion resistance, tantalum metal exhibits numerous physical properties of interest to chemical engineers (e.g., high melting point, good electrical and thermal conductivities, high elastic modulus, and high yield tensile strength). Therefore, tantalum is the construction material to consider in any application where corrosion is a factor and the long-term benefits of reduced downtime, increased equipment life, and increased profitability are important. It is also often used in pharmaceutical, biotechnological, and foodstuff processes. Moreover, owing to its similarity with glass, it is sometimes used for assembling pipes or for making repairs in glass-lined technology.

Pharmaceutical industry

Tantalum has many applications in pharmaceutical plants. Tantalum alloys are preferred over other corrosion-resistant materials because they exhibit higher corrosion resistance, and hence the zero contamination preserves product purity and offers the versatility to reuse the same processing equipment for many applications.

Hightemperature applications

The combination of suitable physical properties such as high melting point, good mechanical strength at elevated temperature, good thermal conductivity, and ease of fabrication allow tantalum and its alloys to be used for applications requiring high operating temperatures in an inert atmosphere or vacuum. Therefore, tantalum is extensively used as a resistance heater for vacuum furnaces, thermocouple sheaths, thermowells, crucibles for melting specialty glasses, crucibles for evaporation of refractory compounds, heat shields, and finally containers for handling liquid alkali metals and their vapors.

Metallurgy

Tantalum is used as an alloying element up to 12 wt.% in specialty superalloys for particular aircraft applications (e.g., turbine blades). Tantalum provides solid-solution strengthening, reacts with interstitial carbon to form stable carbides, and improves the thermal stability of intermetallic compounds.

Electrochemical and corrosion engineering

A better electrical conductivity and higher corrosion resistance in harsh environments compared to other common reactive and refractory metals (e.g., titanium, zirconium, niobium) used as an electrode-based metal are responsible for tantalum’s use in association with niobium as base metal for platinized anodes as a replacement for titanium substrates.Moreover, tantalum is also used as a base metal in dimensionally stable anodes (i.e., DSA® type electrodes) in some electrochemical processes in harsh conditions, i.e., requiring a high anodic current density, a high temperature, and a concentrated acidic media or brines.

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