HIsarna holds big hope for green, low-cost iron making: Tata Steel

The HIsarna iron making technology being developed jointly by a consortium of steelmakers in Europe led by Tata Steel, holds prospects of not only being a major green technology but also promises 25% savings in terms of capital expenditure (capex) and operational expenditure (opex).

The technology, which has steel makers ThyssenKrupp Steel Europe, ArcelorMittal and Salzgitter on board, is based on a cyclone reactor, patented by Tata Steel Europe, for melting iron ore, which combines beneath to a HI-smelt (bath smelter) developed by Rio Tinto in Australia.

"The technology when implemented would see huge capex and opex reductions, as the process does not have coke and sinter making but uses 100% oxygen, which is an additional cost," UK-based Tata Steel group director, Research & Development (R&D) Debashish Bhattacharjee told FE.

From the previous stage of hot trials where the process was tried out continuously for three-four days at 8 tonne per hour capacity, the project has now reached stage-two trial, where it would see continuous operations for a week, with the entire second-stage trials slated to go on for the next two months. "It is one of the technologies that looks feasible today as a green iron making process like Finex, which of course is much more costlier and complex process than HIsarna promises to be," added Bhattacharjee.

All trials are being carried out at Tata Steel Europe's IJmuiden works in The Netherlands. "Depending on the trial results, we will decide on upscaling it", said the Tata Steel group R&D director, adding the third and final third set of trial has been scheduled for the middle of next year (2013).

On the basis of results of the 2013 trials, the project would be upscaled to the semi-commercial 60 tonne per day stage in three years from now, as all equipment would need to be designed to order. The HIsarna process, unlike the most commonly followed blast furnace route of iron making, which requires coke, sinter and iron ore pellets as inputs, uses iron ore fines, non-coking coal fines, some flux and pure oxygen as inputs.

... contd.

ALSO READ

Resilient in comeback: Gold heads for 4% weekly gain despite profit-booking

Centre to take call on sugar decontrol before Budget

DGH to invite bids for seven CBM blocks under fifth round of auction

Is gold’s bull-run over after 12 years of gains?