Ivittuut (formerly, Ivigtût) (Kalaallisut: "Grassy Place"[1]) is an abandoned mining town near Cape Desolation in southwestern Greenland, in the modern Sermersooq municipality on the ruins of the former Norse Middle Settlement.

[4] These early mines simply processed the cryolite for its direct aluminum content and for sale to the Pennsylvania Salt Manufacturing Company, which used it to create caustic soda.

The 1884 establishment of the Hall-Heroult process, which depends on the rare cryolite but dramatically improved the extraction of aluminum from bauxite ore, increased the deposit's importance.

The Ivittuut mining operations were a major factor in the American occupation of Greenland during World War II.

After World War II, the cryolite was mined by the Danish firm Kryolitselskabet Øresund, which helped fund the establishment of Grønlandsfly, today's Air Greenland.