Zirconium dioxide of Mars to provide both fuel and oxidizer that could be used as a store of chemical energy for use with surface transportation on Mars. Carbon monoxide/oxygen engines have been suggested for early surface transportation use as both carbon monoxide and oxygen can be straightforwardly produced by zirconia electrolysis without requiring use of any of the Martian water resources to obtain hydrogen, which would be needed for the production of methane or any hydrogen-based fuels. Zirconia is also a potential high-k dielectric material with potential applications as an insulator in transistors. Zirconia is also employed in the deposition of optical
Zirconium a quadruple VAM (vacuum arc melting) process, combined with hot extruding and different rolling applications is cured using high-pressure, high-temperature gas autoclaving. This produces reactor-grade zirconium that is about 10 times more expensive than the hafnium-contaminated commercial grade. Hafnium must be removed from zirconium for nuclear applications because hafnium has a neutron absorption cross-section 600 times greater than zirconium. The separated hafnium can be used for reactor control rods. Like other transition metals, zirconium forms a wide range of inorganic compounds and coordination complexes. In general, these compounds are colourless diamagnetic solids wherein zirconium has the oxidation state +4. Far