An eco-friendly electrolytic process for the production of aluminium

The present invention relates to an eco-friendly electrolytic process for the production of aluminum from fused salts such as alumina dissolved in cryolite melt. This eco-friendly electrolytic process for the production of aluminum involves single step electrolysis of alumina to give aluminum metal and pure oxygen gas, which can be concentrated and sold as a valuable co-product along with the primary product, that is aluminum metal. Presently aluminum is produced using consumable carbon anodes. Hitherto during the production of aluminum from alumina, green house gases such as carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide are evolved. The present invention mitigates this, by the use of cermet anode at which only pure oxygen is evolved. Thus the process is eco-friendly not only by the elimination of CO2 and CO during the electrolysis but also enhances the environmental hygiene by the addition of pure oxygen gas. The electrolysis can be carried out in closed electrolysers to give higher space time yield. The process of the invention enables the production of aluminum metal by a green process. The purity of the product is of the order of 99.4% at an average current efficiency of 85% and an energy consumption of 13.4 Kwh per Kg of aluminum.