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MadeOfAtoms (talk | contribs) Undid revision 1230296892 by Physhist (talk) restore use as a pickling agent in steelmaking |
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===Industrial cleaning agent===
{{Main|Cleaning agent}}
Sulfuric acid is used in large quantities by the [[iron]] and [[steelmaking]] [[steel industry|industry]] to [[pickling (metal)|remove]] oxidation, [[rust]], and [[fouling|scaling]] from rolled sheet and billets prior to sale to the [[automobile]] and [[major appliances]] industry.{{citation needed|date=September 2011}} Used acid is often recycled using a spent acid regeneration (SAR) plant. These plants combust spent acid{{clarify|reason="What is it, exactly? Is it still the same acid, dirty, reacted, or what?"|date=February 2015}} with natural gas, refinery gas, fuel oil or other fuel sources. This combustion process produces gaseous [[sulfur dioxide]] ({{chem2|SO2}}) and [[sulfur trioxide]] ({{chem2|SO3}}) which are then used to manufacture "new" sulfuric acid. SAR plants are common additions to metal smelting plants, oil refineries, and other industries where sulfuric acid is consumed in bulk, as operating a SAR plant is much cheaper than the recurring costs of spent acid disposal and new acid purchases.
[[Hydrogen peroxide]] ({{chem2|H2O2}}) can be added to sulfuric acid to produce [[piranha solution]], a powerful but very toxic cleaning solution with which substrate surfaces can be cleaned. Piranha solution is typically used in the microelectronics industry, and also in laboratory settings to clean glassware.
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