Mercury is the only metal that is that is liquid at room temperature. It is a silvery liquid that you can move around in your hands easily, which is how it got the nickname quicksilver.

This metal has many uses including being used in older thermometers, and being used to extract gold. This is possible because it has the ability to bond with gold, which makes it possible to remove virtually all gold from different areas. Mercury has been used both in traditional mining of gold, and for removing gold from electronic devices so that it can be recycled.

While mercury was once played with by children, it is now known to be very toxic and dangerous. It is this toxicity that makes it a problematic element, especially when used in mining and other processes.

When miners find gold that is within rocks, it can be difficult to extract. So, mercury is mixed in with the rocks, which dissolves the gold and leaves the normal rock behind. The mixture of mercury and gold, called gold amalgam, is then squeezed through a porous material, which gets rid of the nonreacted mercury, leaving behind pure gold amalgam.

To get the gold back out of the gold amalgam, they raise the temperature to 356.7 degrees Celsius (674 Fahrenheit), turning the mercury to gas, leaving the gold behind.

Unfortunately, this process creates a toxic cloud of vaporized mercury, which can be harmful to humans and animals. When done properly, the mercury vapor can be captured and cooled down safely. Unfortunately, many facilities do not go through the proper process to safely collect the mercury vapor.

This results in about 1000 tones of vaporized mercury being released into the environment each year, according to a 2018 paper.

While there have been improvements with how mercury is used in the gold mining and recycling industries, there is still a long way to go, which means miners and people living in communities near processing facilities continue to be at risk.

Quicksilver is a festinating metal with some very dangerous properties.

If you think that’s impressive, check out this story about a “goldmine” of lithium that was found in the U.S. that could completely change the EV battery game.