Human progress is often defined by how well particular elements of the earth are harnessed: the bronze age, the iron age, and the silicon age are common delineations of history. Yet the most abundant metal in the earth's crust, which has played a pivotal role in myriad technologies and inventions from aircraft to soda cans - aluminum - has largely been neglected in such grand conversations of technological development. This book seeks to use the story of aluminum for broader lessons on sustainable production and consumption of "non-renewable resources." The book explores how scarcity and abundance of natural resources are contested concepts based on energy investments in extraction, modularity/durability of products, and eventual circularity of material flows. The story of aluminum's presence in human technologies is thus a corollary for a broader conversation about how science and industry have challenged natural limits, and how we can more sustainably manage elemental resources of our planet. This book weaves together narratives of scientific inquiry and industrial innovation that inform the element's role in geoscience and engineering. -- Adapted from publisher's description.

Salt and sod. Elemental origins and the invention of need ; Soil without soul : why aluminum was rejected by life -- Precious forces. Unbreakable bonds : the challenge of extraction ; The bond breakers and their bounty -- Flight and foil. Mobile metal : how aluminum facilitated war and peace ; Aluminum for all : the invention of a household metal -- Elemental flows. Recycling and realism : the industrial ecology paradigm ; Restoration and renewal of mineral frontiers -- Epilogue : governing our planet's elemental resources.