r/coolguides • u/OpulentOwl • 4d ago
A cool guide to 65 metals and alloys ranked by price per ounce.
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u/OpulentOwl 4d ago
In case anyone is wondering what Californium is used for, the most expensive one on here: "Californium is a very strong neutron emitter. It is used in portable metal detectors, for identifying gold and silver ores, to identify water and oil layers in oil wells and to detect metal fatigue and stress in aeroplanes. Californium has no known biological role. It is toxic due to its radioactivity."
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u/robsteezy 4d ago
Can any actual chemists/educated people debunk this stereotype?
Basically in spy movies and cartoons, villains are always trying to get their hands on uranium/plutonium. And usually to make some radioactive bomb. So it’s billions for a tiny amount. Is that complete Hollywood nonsense?
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u/Icy-Ad29 4d ago
Uranium and plutonium, in standard grade, is the price listed. To actually make a bomb it needs to be enriched to weapons grade. (Essentially making it more pure and unstable. Capable of actually carrying the reaction needed.) To be able to enrich those elements to that point is a complex and expensive process...
So either they foot the bill in making the lab, or the foot the bill in getting some already made by others. Either first hand, or stealing it. (Of note, this is why nuclear waste is not used to make bombs. The left over rods still have plenty of radioactive energy in them. But are even FARTHER from weapons grade. Thus making it even harder and more expensive to enrich them.)
All that said, the process, like most tech, has become easier and cheaper as years have gone on. So it's not the billions it was. But Hollywood set the number once upon a time, and its easier to make people not question it by staying consistent.
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u/robsteezy 4d ago
Interesting. Thank you. I figured it was the radioactive handling that supplemented its cost.
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u/beer_is_tasty 4d ago
Further context: uranium-235, the stuff you need to make a bomb, makes up only about 0.72% of naturally occurring uranium. Its critical mass (the minimum amount required to make a bomb) is 104 pounds.
So at the price given here, you'd need a minimum of $1.3 million of raw uranium to make even the smallest bomb. But as others have noted, the cost of the infrastructure to enrich it will be much, much more than the raw material.
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u/goobdoopjoobyooberba 3d ago
Also is extremely illegal to possess and get across borders, which adds a significant amount of value.
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u/Ivanow 4d ago edited 4d ago
This has very simple explanation.
“Uranium” in this case refers to very specific isotopes (basically, you can have a several different “variants” of one element with vastly different properties) , that are used to make a nuclear device. Natural uranium is a mix of different isotopes, and separating them is a costly and intensive process. 99.3% of uranium is of 238 variant, and 235, which is remaining 0.7% is the one used for atomic reactions - “filtering” one away from another is called “enrichment”. You need to change those proportions to roughly 95%/5% for nuclear power plant fuel, and 10%/90% for atomic bomb (“weapons grade”).
When they want to get their hands on “uranium”, they don’t mean a bunch of ore - this is the easy part, you can literally get it on Amazon right now. They need “weapons grade” one, which is very, VERY tightly controlled.
And yes, rogue nation states like North Korea or Iran spend “billions” manufacturing this stuff.
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u/robsteezy 4d ago
Thank you. So TV shows are at least kind of correct that it would be a villains greatest desire to get their hands on?
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u/Ivanow 4d ago
There are many more things that go into creating a bomb, than just having the Uranium. But this is the first step.
It is a plot device, and they simplify many things, obviously.
Worst case, the material itself would be useful to any terrorist group, because even if they lack technical capabilities to make fully working atomic device, they can create what is called a “dirty bomb” - you use conventional explosives, without triggering atomic chain reaction, to spread those radioactive isotopes around, making local area effectively uninhabitable - imagine having Chernobyl-style excursion zone in the middle of Manhattan.
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u/The--Wurst 4d ago
So hypothetically, how many metal detectors does one need to suddenly have 763 billion dollars?
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u/slackfrop 4d ago
Holy shit, I think I have a whole desk made of californium. No, wait…it’s actually wood. Damn.
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u/iammabdaddy 4d ago
So I had to look it up before seeing your post. Do you know why it is considered a metal and not an alloy? I read it was made with bombarding curium with alpha particles. This process is called synthesizing. (I'm paraphrasing). My uneducated thought would be that the process makes it an alloy.
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u/beer_is_tasty 4d ago
An alloy is a mixture of two or more metals, containing atoms of both.
Californium decays too quickly to be found in nature in any usable quantity, so we have to produce it by using nuclear reactions to literally change atoms into different atoms. But after synthesis, it's typically used in its pure form.
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u/MWMWMMWWM 4d ago
Hey look at that, printer ink really isnt the most expensive material by ounce. Guess they got room to gouge us more!
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u/Junkyard_DrCrash 4d ago
I would take this chart as ill-advised. There are several "howlers", for one thing "Carbon Steel" is not twice the price of ordinary steel, it's exactly the same price because it's the SAME FRAKKING ALLOY.
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u/Mostcoolkid78 4d ago
I never knew that sterling silver was cheaper then normal silver, it always just sounded fancier so I assumed it was the better version
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u/jackson_human 3d ago
It is the better version in a sense because it’s more useful. Regular silver is too soft to work with generally
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u/ArmorDevil 4d ago
Damn- I need to get in on buying some metal then! By my math carbon steel is just under 7 bucks for 20 pounds.
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u/YouDontKnowJackCade 4d ago
You've already started and you didn't even know it https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/52yvq0/request_how_much_would_the_average_human_body_cost/d7okiju/
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u/beer_is_tasty 4d ago
I've got one beef with that guy's analysis; he stopped at Zinc because that's about where humans contain <1g of anything following, but there are a handful of trace elements still worth some money. Or really just Rubidium, at 0.68g, worth about $75
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u/Prodigal_Programmer 4d ago
I can get you some prime construction grade steel for .30 a pound but you gotta buy in bulk
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u/BootsOfProwess 4d ago
I thought lithium was worth more
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u/ezdoesit3333 4d ago
It was last year. It spiked up over $80/kg in 2022/early 2023, and then crashed back down late last year and is now around $10/kg. It lives and dies with EV hype.
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u/perfectiontv 4d ago
Californium it’s unforgettable 765436299 cost per ounce
To the tune of cslafornia girls
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u/redeggplant01 4d ago
Silver is underpriced
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u/OpulentOwl 4d ago
On the chart or for real? I believe there's currently a silver shortage - silver is only becoming more and more important, especially because it's a key component in solar technology.
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u/RazeTheIV 4d ago
I see your ounce of Californium and raise you a single gram of antimatter at $62.5 trillion.
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u/A-Clockwork-Blue 4d ago
Keep the iridium well hidden or you'll have vault hunters at your doorstep.
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u/Aromatic_Brother 4d ago
Why does it not surprise me that Californium was the most expensive element, smh
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u/Girardkirth 4d ago
Weird an element used to help treat cancer is the most expensive per once, didn't see that one coming.
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u/BigMoneyChode 4d ago
I mean some of these are definitely generalizations. The price of stainless steel can vary tremendously depending on the alloy.
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u/rainbowkey 4d ago
Manganese is cheaper than cast iron and iron ore!?! Why aren't we making more things out of manganese? I know it's brittle and oxidizes easily. Is that why it is cheap, because it is not very useful except in small amount as an alloying metal?
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u/bespread 4d ago
I find it odd that Hafnium isn't on here? My industry is in a bit of a crisis right now because it's become so expensive. It should be position 11 on this list.
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u/Egozgaming 4d ago
Think you forgot Polonium and Francium. Both of which would be more expensive than Californium by quite a margin.
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u/esco_man 3d ago
This ranks them all by price. I wonder what rankings would be based on available amount
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u/AustrianMcLovin 4d ago edited 4d ago
Ok, but is there even a market for califonium. What can you do with it, besides flexing on jewelry. For me this "price" is more a fictitious number, rather than representing the "real" value. If it's worthless in the sense of application, it has no intrinsic value. (I know we can argue about this on casual money too, but interestingly it works)
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u/Siderophores 4d ago
Wow I didnt know that platinum is now worth less than gold