Material Insights · Understanding the Material World

Argon

The inert gas that shields welds, stirs steel and protects chip and solar-ingot furnaces, recovered only from large oxygen plants.

Commodity chemicals · Industrial gases · No. 16

  • Single chemical
  • Feedstock: Air
  • world output not published; US sales about 1.1 billion m3 (about 2.0 Mt) in 2025
  • 0.3 t CO₂e per t
  • HS 280421
Commodity chemicals · Industrial gases · Foundation · Matter

Argon can run short even when nobody wants more, because it only appears when someone else is making oxygen.

Chart: Illustration: Argon

Where it comes from

Chart: Map of where it comes from

Argon boils between nitrogen and oxygen, so it collects in an air separation unit's oxygen column and is drawn off and refined to 99.999%.

Three things to know
  1. Argon is only recovered when a big air separation unit makes oxygen, so steel or ammonia shutdowns can starve the market.
  2. Welding takes 66% of US argon and steelmaking 20%, with electronics and solar ingots most of the rest.
  3. Bulk argon cost about $786/t delivered to India in August 2026, about 13% above Chinese export argon at $695/t.
The journey
  1. 1 Large ASUOnly big oxygen plants recover argon
  2. 2 Crude argonSide-draw from the oxygen column
  3. 3 RefiningPurified to 99.999% argon
  4. 4 Liquid deliveryTrucked at -186 C to users
  5. 5 CylindersFilled pure or blended with CO2
Covered in The chemical industry: what it makes and how it is organisedChemicalsHow a chemical process works: reactions, separations, catalysts and flowsheetsChemicalsHeavy inorganics: salt, sulphur, nitrogen and phosphorusChemicalsThe laws of energy: conservation, entropy and efficiencyEnergy
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