A REVIEW OF PROGRESS OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF NEW IRONMAKING TECHNOLOGIES

There is a revolution on the horizon in the iron and steel industry with the development of new direct smelting technology for the high intensity production of liquid iron from iron ore fines and agglomerates. These processes have the potential to completely replace the conventional blast furnace production of hot metal as they offer processing advantages such as: use of coal rather than metallurgical coke use of iron ore fines rather than lump ores or sinter economic operation at small scale (250,000-500,000 T/A) lower capital costs increased flexibility in operation and materials use greater environmental control The paper will discuss the technical and economic environment which is prompting the development of the new processes. This will include a review of direct smelting process fundamentals and the range of processing options offered by the new technology. Past developments will be briefly discussed as an introduction to a review of the current group of processes with potential for commercialization over the next 5-10 years. There is a high level of activity in Europe, Japan, Australia, South Africa and the USA devoted to the development of these new generation processes. Groups include British Steel, CRA/Midrex, Voest-Alpine AG, the American Iron and Steel Institute and most of the major Japanese iron and steel companies (Kawasaki, Sumitomo, Nippon Steel, Kobe, NKK) who are developing their own processes and contributing to a National Project on smelting reduction. The processes arising from these groups will be compared and contrasted to provide an analysis of their chances of technical and economic success.