Carbon as coke

Pure elemental silicon is a hard, dark gray solid with a metallic luster and with a crystalline structure the same as that of the diamond form of carbon. For this reason, silicon shows many chemical and physical similarities. There is also a brown, powdery form of silicon having a microcrystalline form. The element is prepared commercially by reducing the oxide by reacting it with carbon (as coke) in electric furnaces. On a small scale, silicon has been obtained from the oxide by reduction with aluminum meted. 

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