Download article as a PDF. In most states and jurisdictions, security deposit laws allow a landlord to deduct from a security deposit for any damage or excessive dirtiness, but not for any expected, normal wear-and-tear.
Nonmetals also have high electron affinity. This means that it is energetically favorable to add an electron to a nonmetal. So, nonmetals can be easily reduced. Metals tend to have low electron affinity so it is more difficult to add electrons (or reduce them). In short: Metals have low ionization energies and low electron affinities so they are readily oxidized. Nonmetals have high ionization energies and high electron affinities so they are readily reduced.
It is also useful as a metallurgical reducing agent, because at high temperatures it reduces many metal oxides to the elemental metal. For example, copper(II) oxide, CuO, and iron(III) oxide, Fe2O3, are both reduced to the metal by carbon monoxide.