History of Titanium Industry Development

In 1791,the English priest W.Gregor discovered a new metal element in black magnetite.In 1795,the German chemist M.H.Klaproth also discovered this element when studying rutile,and named it after the Greek god Titans.In 1910,American scientist M.A.Hunter first reduced TiCI with sodium to produce pure titanium.In 1940,Luxembourg scientist W.J.Kroll reduced TiCl with magnesium to produce pure titanium.From then on,the magnesium reduction method(also known as the Claus method)and the sodium reduction method(also known as the Hunter method)became industrial methods for producing sponge titanium.In 1948,the United States produced 2T sponge titanium using magnesium reduction method,which reached industrial production scale.Subsequently,the United Kingdom,Japan,the former Soviet Union,and China also entered industrial production,with the main titanium producing countries being the former Soviet Union,Japan,and the United States.

Titanium is a new metal that is widely used in industrial production such as aviation,aerospace,chemical,petroleum,metallurgy,light industry,power,seawater desalination,ships,and daily appliances due to its excellent properties.It is known as a modern metal.The production of titanium metal has only been half a century since 1948.It is a new industry developed with the aviation and space industry industries.Its development has undergone several ups and downs,due to the connection between titanium and the aircraft manufacturing industry.But overall,the development speed of titanium is very fast,surpassing the development speed of any other non-ferrous metal.This can be seen from the development of the sponge titanium industry worldwide:the production scale of sponge titanium was 60kt/a in the 1960s,1Okt/a in the 1970s,130kt/a in the 1980s,and had reached 140kt/a by 1992.The actual production reached a historical high of 105 kt/a in 1990.

After entering the 1990s,due to a decrease in military titanium production and some countries such as Russia selling off their inventory of sponge titanium,the market was weak in previous years.In 1995,the titanium market began to recover,mainly due to the substantial increase in the volume of civil aircraft such as the B777 and golf clubs.In 1996,the demand for titanium reached a new high.Experts predict that the demand for titanium will continue to increase significantly in the coming years.The main reason currently hindering the application of titanium is its high price.It can be expected that with the progress of science and technology,the continuous improvement of titanium production processes,the expansion of enterprise production capacity and improvement of management level,and the further reduction of titanium product costs,a wider titanium market will inevitably be opened up.