Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elements

Potassium has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Z1720 (talk) 03:24, 18 January 2026 (UTC)

I did not address all concerns, but I tried to expand or reconcile or rephrase the chemistry part. Other editors are encouraged to edit or modify or trash-talk or whatever my prose. Especially in view of the next proposal below.--Smokefoot (talk) 00:40, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

We all know that Na and K are quite similar chemically, one could toss in Rb even though it is less important. The inventory of compounds for Na, K, and Rb are very similar. It seems logical that we try to agree on certain core components of the chemistry section of these three articles. Such a presentation style would help readers and simplify page maintenance. Here is an excerpt (of an unreviewed) section:

"Binary compounds Potassium forms many binary compounds, i.e., compounds of potassium and one other element. The inventory is so extensive that one gap merits mention: no nitride of potassium is known. Potassium hydride forms directly from the elements:[33] 2 K + H2 → 2 KH It is a white, pyrophoric solid that finds some use as a base. All of the halides salts are well known: potassium fluoride (KF), potassium chloride (KCl), and potassium bromide (KF), potassium iodide (KI). Four oxides of potassium are well studied: potassium oxide (K2O), potassium peroxide (K2O2), potassium superoxide (KO2)[34] These species all hydrolyze (react with water) to give potassium hydroxide. Similarly an extensive array of sulfides, selenides, and tellurides are well characterized. Although such simple salts are typically white and diamagnetic, KO2 is something of an exception, being deep yellow and paramagnetic.

Ternary and more complex compounds Although rarely encountered in anhydrous form, KOH is one of the dominant compounds of potassium from the commercial perspective. It is a strong base and highly corrosive. Illustrative of its hydrophilic character, as much as 1.21 kg of KOH can dissolve in a liter of water.[35][36] KOH reacts readily with carbon dioxide (CO2) to produce potassium carbonate (K2CO3), and in principle could be used to remove traces of the gas from air. Like the closely related sodium hydroxide, KOH reacts with fats to produce soaps. Moreso than sodium soaps, which are preferred for cake soap, potassium-based soaps are more soluble in water and are used in soap dispensers.[37] Nitrate, nitrite, sulfate, and various phosphates also form potassium salts, all white solids, that are widely used. Illustrating the thermal stability typical for these materials, potassium nitrate, sodium nitrate, and sodium nitrite form a eutectic, which remains liquid from 142 to 600 °C.[38]"

One reason not to follow my idea is that the articles quickly would fall out of lock step as edits creep in.

This mirroring approach could possibly be applied to some other articles. For example some alkali earth metals and some lanthanides.--Smokefoot (talk) 00:40, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

I think it is a great idea for a campaign to rewrite all three articles at once – it's just that, as you say, after a while edits will make them fall out of lockstep. (Which doesn't necessarily mean we shouldn't do it.) Double sharp (talk) 00:59, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

Most of the properties in the above excerpt also apply to lithium and caesium. It should be mentioned that solubility of alkali-metal perchlorates in water drops rapidly after sodium — this is currently mentioned only for francium. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 03:09, 22 January 2026 (UTC)

Please note that User:An anonymous username, not my real name and perhaps some others have very recently done mass AfD nominations of chemistry/elements related data pages. So far I have seen ones for Boiling points of the elements (data page), Lithium chloride (data page), Melting points of the elements (data page) and Atomic radii of the elements (data page); there may be more science related pages done or planned. Maybe I missed it, but this is certainly something that I think should have been discussed at Wikiproject chemistry and perhaps here first for a concensus.

You can express opinions on this both at WT:Chemistry#Mass AfD nominations of chemistry related data pages and at the respective AfD pages (go to the main page then follow the link). AfD discussions are typically open for at least 7 days. Ldm1954 (talk) 02:47, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

For the chemical elements data pages this will create a problem if they are deleted: at the moment the chemical element infoboxes all link to Chemical elements data references and thence to the data pages. Therefore, the information in the infoboxes will be unreferenced if these deletions go through.

I have put in keep votes under the elements ones, but in case the deletions succeed, I have copied over the data pages into my userspace. That should give us time in that case to deal with moving all the citations to get away from this 2005 system... Double sharp (talk) 07:50, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Comment, there have been multiple comments/votes at the AfD pages, which to me tend towards WP:SNOW keep. There are a few issues on data pages for specific compounds as mentioned by Fishsicles at WT:Chemistry#Chemistry data page cleanup which I think merit further discussion to establish a consensus for the future. If you are interested please comment at that discussion.

Ldm1954 (talk) 16:28, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Rhodium has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Z1720 (talk) 23:07, 18 February 2026 (UTC)