The electrical extraction and refining of metals

At the outset I feel that an apology is due for the character of this paper. Written at the suggestion of your Council and with a time limit, it must necessarily partake rather of the character of a lecture than of a technical paper. Nevertheless, the subject is doubtless sufficiently outside the ordinary “beat” of most electrical engineers for an account of the manner in which electricity is utilised for these purposes to be of some interest. It is perhaps hardly necessary to say that both the heating and electro-chemical effects of electrical currents are employed in electro-thermal and electrolytic methods respectively, and for convenience the subject is often dealt with under these two heads.