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[edit] Motivation

I've often been wondering about prices of different elements that may or may not be of technological importance. Is erbium available on the market at all, and is it more or less expensive than gold? Would the cost of lithium render this or that idea feasible? (You may say that I'm a weirdo, but I'm not the only one...). I have been looking, but haven't found any openly accessible internet pages that collect information like that, and so I hope to make this page a resource for that. I'm aware that the "price" of an element is a fluctuating and very poorly defined value, but order-of-magnitude estimates should be possible. In any case the page would serve as a list of references.

[edit] Implementation

The way I've set up stuff is probably not very good so feel free to improve or criticise it. For a start i propose the following guidelines for discussion:

What elements and compounds to list

• The element itself in commonly traded purities and forms.
• Isotopes commonly traded.
• Compounds:
  • That are commonly traded
  • Contain mainly the element and
  • Are traded mainly for their content of the element in question (As an example I've included NH₃ which i consider a borderline case).

What prices to prefer in listing

• Bulk (amounts large enough to avoid retail markup, but not big enough to skew world market)
• International market (no taxes).
• Prices averaged over a period. (Or better, give a range, to indicate fluctuations).
• Recent prices (but not "current", see above)

Finally: List anything you find - especially if there's nothing on the element yet. If you know a reference, just including it might be a great help. Add forms/compounds to the list if you think they're worthy, even if you don't know their price. Let's keep it eventualist for now.

Nvj 13:03, 17 October 2007 (UTC)