The evolution of iron making

Dancy, T. E.

doi:10.1007/bf02657648

“…Several previous Howe lecturers, including Szekely, [1] Brotzman, [2] and Dancy, [3] examined future technologies. Several previous Howe lecturers, including Szekely, [1] Brotzman, [2] and Dancy, [3] examined future technologies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Future steelmaking technologies and the role of basic research

Fruehan¹

1997

Metall Mater Trans A

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The steel industry is going through a technological revolution that will not only change how steel is produced but also the entire structure of the industry. The drivers for the new or improved technologies, including reduction in capital requirements, possible shortages in raw materials such as coke and low residual scrap, environmental concerns, and customer demands are briefly examined. The required response of the industry to these drivers will be new processes such as direct ironmaking, near net shape casting, and those to improve charge materials to the electric arc furnace (EAF).The know-how for these process improvements and revolutionary technologies can be purchased, if it exists. However, since the U.S. industry has a unique set of drivers, it may be necessary to develop many of the new technologies through its own research and development. The current status of research and development in the United States and selected international producers was examined. As expected, it was found that the industry's research capabilities have been greatly reduced. Furthermore, less than half of the companies that identified a given technology as critical have significant research and development programs addressing the technology. It is clear that, in many cases, these technologies must be developed collaboratively using all of the intellectual resources available, including universities. Much of the basic process understanding and data for optimization can be obtained from basic research, which is highly focused on the requirements of the new process, thus eliminating some expensive pilot plant trials.Examples of how basic research aided in process improvements in the past are given. The examples include demonstrating how fundamentals of reaction kinetics, improved nitrogen control, and thermodynamics of systems helped reduce nozzle clogging and how fluid flow studies reduced defects in casting. However, in general, basic research did not play a major role in processes previously developed but helped our understanding and aided optimization. To have a major impact, basic research must be focused and be an integral part of any new process development. An example where this has been done successfully is the AISI Direct Ironmaking and Waste Oxide Recycle projects, in which fundamental studies on reduction, slag foaming, and postcombustion reactions have led to process understanding, control, and optimization. Industry leaders recognize the value and need for basic research but insist it be truly relevant and done with industry input. From these examples, the lessons learned on how to make basic research more effective are discussed.

show abstract

“…Several previous Howe lecturers, including Szekely, [1] Brotzman, [2] and Dancy, [3] examined future technologies. It is interesting to look back on their predictions and what actually has emerged.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Future steelmaking technologies and the role of basic research

Fruehan¹

1997

Metall Mater Trans B

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The steel industry is going through a technological revolution that will not only change how steel is produced but also the entire structure of the industry. The drivers for the new or improved technologies, including reduction in capital requirements, possible shortages in raw materials such as coke and low residual scrap, environmental concerns, and customer demands are briefly examined. The required response of the industry to these drivers will be new processes such as direct ironmaking, near net shape casting, and those to improve charge materials to the electric arc furnace (EAF).The know-how for these process improvements and revolutionary technologies can be purchased, if it exists. However, since the U.S. industry has a unique set of drivers, it may be necessary to develop many of the new technologies through its own research and development. The current status of research and development in the United States and selected international producers was examined. As expected, it was found that the industry's research capabilities have been greatly reduced. Furthermore, less than half of the companies that identified a given technology as critical have significant research and development programs addressing the technology. It is clear that, in many cases, these technologies must be developed collaboratively using all of the intellectual resources available, including universities. Much of the basic process understanding and data for optimization can be obtained from basic research, which is highly focused on the requirements of the new process, thus eliminating some expensive pilot plant trials.Examples of how basic research aided in process improvements in the past are given. The examples include demonstrating how fundamentals of reaction kinetics, improved nitrogen control, and thermodynamics of systems helped reduce nozzle clogging and how fluid flow studies reduced defects in casting. However, in general, basic research did not play a major role in processes previously developed but helped our understanding and aided optimization. To have a major impact, basic research must be focused and be an integral part of any new process development. An example where this has been done successfully is the AISI Direct Ironmaking and Waste Oxide Recycle projects, in which fundamental studies on reduction, slag foaming, and postcombustion reactions have led to process understanding, control, and optimization. Industry leaders recognize the value and need for basic research but insist it be truly relevant and done with industry input. From these examples, the lessons learned on how to make basic research more effective are discussed.

show abstract

“…As shown in Table I, other molten sulfide systems that also exhibit semiconducting properties such as Ni-S, Co-S, Sn-S, Ag-S, Pb-S [19][20][21]29,30 are of interest from both a cost and performance perspective. Unfortunately, a dearth of experimental or modeling physical and chemical property data currently limits our ability to further support the development of molten sulfides as potential thermoelectric materials.…”

Section: Opportunity Offered By Molten Semiconductorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Molten Semiconductors for High Temperature Thermoelectricity

Zhao

¹

,

Rinzler

²

,

Allanore

³

2016

ECS J. Solid State Sci. Technol.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

High temperature (>900 • C) industrial waste heat recovery remains a key challenge for thermoelectric materials. The unique combination of high temperature, low heat-flux, and large surface area of waste heat generation as analyzed herein shows that active materials cost is the main metric inhibiting application. Molten compounds with semiconducting properties are therefore proposed as a cost-effective addition to solid-state materials for these conditions. A review of prior experimental results is presented, after which we demonstrate the performance of a laboratory-scale device based on molten SnS. The results allow reporting, for the first time, the Figure of Merit (Z T ) and the conversion efficiency of the candidate materials. In addition, the Seebeck coefficient of molten SnS is reported. The results confirm the opportunity offered by molten thermoelectric compounds and allow discussion of the remaining materials and engineering challenges that need to be tackled in order to envision the future deployment of thermoelectric devices based on molten semiconductors. Industrial waste heat represents an important source of energy (around 5% of the total US annual energy production, i.e. 1,000,000 GWh), a significant fraction of it being generated at high temperature (around 20% of the industrial waste heat is at T > 650• C).1 Because of such high exergy, there is an interest in directly recovering this energy in the form of electricity, potentially via thermoelectric conversion.Though exceptional progress on solid-state materials for thermoelectrics has been accomplished, including extending their maximum range of operating temperature, there are to date no material systems and devices that have been implemented in the factories which generate this high quality waste heat.We herein first analyze the cost and materials properties required to potentially enable such deployment. The analysis reveals that for large-scale (i.e. large surface of heat dissipation), low heat-flux and high temperature applications such as primary steel or glass production, the cost of the thermoelectric materials is the primary driver for materials choice. In addition, the heat-generating locations in the existing processes call for materials compatible with very high temperature. Finally, the chosen materials system will have to exhibit mechanical stability when subject to a large temperature difference at high temperature.Additionally, a survey of the prior art and available data show that molten semiconductors are likely to fulfill the majority of the proposed criteria, suggesting the opportunity to complement solid-state materials to extend thermoelectricity to high-temperature industrial waste heat recovery.Finally, the practical opportunity offered by molten thermoelectrics is demonstrated, and both experimental materials property data as well as performance of a laboratory-scale device are reported. The results enable the discussion of the remaining materials science and engineering challenges to allow further developments and fut...

show abstract

The evolution of iron making

Cited by 8 publications

References 2 publications

Future steelmaking technologies and the role of basic research

Future steelmaking technologies and the role of basic research

Future steelmaking technologies and the role of basic research

Molten Semiconductors for High Temperature Thermoelectricity

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About