SeleniumScrubber Solutions SELENIUM is widely distributed over the world's surface, but the total amount has been calculated to be equal only to that of gold or bromine. The availability of tellurium is less than half that of selenium, and both of these elements are usually classed among the rarer elements. However, they are not rare in the sense of being unavailable to commerce, since nearly 1,000,000 pounds of selenium are recovered yearly in peacetime. World production of tellurium is about 200,000 pounds yearly.Selenium and tellurium are readily available because they are concentrated in small amounts in most of the important sulfide ores of copper, silver, gold, and nickel-copper which are mined in the United States, Canada, Mexico,