Sodium chloride halite

Halite A mineral form of sodium chloride. Halite is a common component of evaporites. 

Some of the Atacama nitrate deposits are relatively pure sodium nitrate (nitratite or soda niter). This is the case with some near-surface veins in bedrock (Ericksen and Mrose, 1972) and with some caliche bianco. However, most of the deposits are impure and contain substantial amounts of other salts, including a range of sulphates, chlorides, nitrates, borates, iodates, perchlorate and chromates. Ericksen (1981), Pueyo et al. (1998) and Searl and Rankin (1993), provide a detailed list of such minerals (Table 12.1), although some of Searl and Rankin s identifications have been challenged by Ericksen (1994). One of the nitrate minerals, humberstonite, derives its name from Humberstone, one of the nitrate towns in the area (Mrose et al., 1970). Of the impurities, sodium chloride (halite) appears to be the most important and may often exceed the percentage of nitrate (see e.g., Penrose, 1910, p. 14). A detailed chemical analysis of the Maria Elena nitrate deposits is provided by Collao et al. (2002). They report (p. 181) ... 

Halite, see Sodium chloride Hausmannite, see Manganese(II,IV) oxide Heavy hydrogen, see HydrogenpH] or name followed by -d... 

In the latter half of the nineteenth centuiy the United States was dependent on the vast Stassfurt deposits of Germany for the potassium compounds needed as fertilizers. In 1911 Congress appropriated funds for a search for domestic minerals, salts, brines, and seaweeds suitable for potash production (67). The complex brines of Searles Lake, California, a rich source of potassium chloride, have been worked up scientifically on the basis of phase-rule studies with outstanding success. Oil drillers exploring the Permian Basin for oil became aware of the possibility of discovering potash deposits through chemical analysis of the cores of saline strata. A rich bed of sylvinite, a natural mixture of sylvite (potassium chloride) and halite (sodium chloride), was found at Carlsbad, New Mexico. At the potash plane near Wendover, Utah, the raw material, a brine, is worked up by solar evaporation (67). 

Millions of years ago, the Great Plains of the United States were ocean. As sea levels fell and at the same time the North American continent rose, many isolated pockets of seawater, called saline lakes, formed. Over time, these lakes evaporated, leaving behind the solids that had been dissolved in the seawater. Most abundant was sodium chloride, which collected in cubic crystals referred to by mineralogists as the mineral halite. When conditions were right, halite crystals like the ones in this chapter s opening photograph would grow to be several centimeters across. 

Chloride. Sodium chloride, common salt, rock salt, halite, NaCl, white solid, soluble, mp 804°C. See also Sodium Chloride. 

Structure type of sodium chloride (rock salt, halite), and its common occurrence... 

The ore zone or stratum typically contains potassium or potassium-magnesium minerals along with halite (sodium chloride). Muriate of potash is refined from sylvinite ore, a mechanical mixture of potassium chloride (KC1) and sodium chloride (NaCl). Because the latter salt is injurious to most crop plants, the KC1 (sylvite) must be separated from the NaCl (halite). 

The chemical category of inorganic salts encompasses many substances that dissociate completely in water, but only one salt, sodium chloride, is referred to by the common name, salt. Sodium chloride is ubiquitous in both its occurrence and its many uses. To date, there are over 14,000 uses for salt.1 Salt is used as a feedstock for many chemicals including chlorine, caustic soda (sodium hydroxide), synthetic soda ash (sodium carbonate), sodium chlorate, sodium sulfate, and metallic sodium. By indirect methods, sodium chloride is also used to produce hydrochloric acid and many other sodium salts. In its natural mineral form, salt may take on some color from some of the trace elements and other salts present, however, pure sodium chloride is a white to colorless crystalline substance, fairly soluble in water.2 Also known as halite, the substance... 

It is generally agreed that most of the chloride in basinal brines has been derived from some combination of the subsurface dissolution of evaporites (e.g., Kharaka et al., 1985 Land, 1997) and the entrapment and/or infiltration of evaporated seawater (e.g.. Carpenter, 1978 Kharaka et al., 1987 Moldovanyi and Walter, 1992). Dissolution of halite produces waters dominated by sodium chloride. Evaporation of seawater produces waters having the general trends shown for ion-Br (Figure 5), Na-Cl (Figure 3) and Ca-Cl (Figure 4), but most formation waters have neither the cation (nor anion) composition of an... 

The Owens Lake dusts are derived from lake bed sediments containing abundant alkaline evaporative salts of sodium, chloride, carbonate/ bicarbonate, and sulfate, including, e.g., halite, natron, thermonatrite, mirabilitie, and trona (Saint Amand et al, 1986). In addition, the dusts contain a variety of silicates and other minerals derived from local alluvial material, and possibly some mine waste materials from the Cerro Gordo lead-zinc-silver mining district on the east end of Owens Lake. 

Minerals have been an important part of our society since the time of prehistoric man. Early humans carved tools out of minerals such as quartz. Pottery has been made of various clays since ancient times. Sodium chloride, also known as the mineral halite, has been used in food preservation techniques for millions of years. Mining of useful minerals out of ores became widespread hundreds of years ago, a practice stiU in use today. 

Sodium never occurs as a free element in nature. It is much too active. It always occurs as part of a compound. The most common source of sodium in Earth is halite. Halite is nearly pure sodium chloride (NaCl). It is also called rock salt. 

Sodium chloride occurs naturally as the mineral halite. Commercially, it is obtained by the solar evaporation of sea water, by mining, or by the evaporation of brine from underground salt deposits. 

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