Abstract:
Methods and systems for producing steel or similar molten-iron-containing materials in melting or smelting furnaces utilizing pre-reduced iron ore, known also as direct reduced iron (DRI) or sponge iron, wherein the emission of CO2 and other greenhouse gases is significantly low. Such methods and systems are based on producing DRI in a direct reduction furnace with a reducing gas comprising hydrogen; melting at least a portion of the DRI in a melting furnace in order to generate hot gases; producing steam and/or hot water using the heat contained in the hot gases. From the steam and/or hot water hydrogen is produced by electrolysis, at least a portion of which is fed to the direct reduction furnace as a component of the reducing gas to produce the DRI.
Abstract:
A method and apparatus for the inspection of a hostile environment includes a sensorized device carrying a plurality of image sensors positioned with different orientations, so as to detect image data of the hostile environment; a support adapted to support the sensorized device in the hostile environment; a processor of the image data generating a spherical and/or three-dimensional image based on the image data; and a remote display device adapted to be positioned outside the hostile environment and in communication with at least the processor of the image data, the plurality of sensors detecting contemporaneous image data of at least 60% of 4π steradians of the hostile environment, the apparatus being adapted for a hostile environment with temperatures and/or atmospheric contaminants harmful or dangerous for human beings.
Abstract:
A method and apparatus closing a slag doorway and cleaning the slag doorway and channel of a metallurgical furnace including walls defining a slag doorway and a slag channel that crosses the slag doorway and has a bottom. The apparatus includes a support structure associable with the furnace, at least one slag-breaking body including a lower border that, under mounting conditions of the apparatus on the furnace, is directed towards the bottom and at a definable height, the slag-breaking body being associated with the support structure in a movable manner along the slag channel away and/or towards the slag doorway to wipe, with its lower border, the bottom or a parallel plane, and a vibrating or oscillating mechanism associated with the slag-breaking body to confer a vibrating or oscillating movement with non null component incident the bottom, during a travel performed during its movement away or towards the slag doorway.
Abstract:
A positioning apparatus (100,100′,100″) for steelmaking lances (300) of an electric arc furnace (200) comprising:—a supporting structure (150,150′) for a steelmaking lance intended to be introduced into said furnace (200) through an opening (230) of said furnace—a linkage (110;120;130;160) associated to said supporting structure (150,150′) and intended to position a carriage (115) linearly movable with respect to said linkage (110;120;130;160) wherein said linkage (110;120;130;160) is an articulated quadrilateral intended to cause said at least one steelmaking lance (330) to be moved from a parking position outside said electric arc furnace to an operating position wherein at least a part of said lance is inside said electric arc furnace and said positioning apparatus (100,100′,100″) further comprises rotation means to cause at least said carriage (115) to rotate about an axis (X) substantially vertical in the assembly condition.
Abstract:
A direct flame furnace burner unit for furnaces for the thermo-chemical treatment of steel strips in continuous hot-dip galvanizing plants includes a burner with a combustion head provided with a combustion chamber having an outlet opening of the combustion flame, and a body to which the combustion head is fixed. The body includes a first chamber which is in communication with the combustion chamber, a first lance for the injection of a fuel into the combustion chamber, a mixing chamber provided with at least a first inlet and a second inlet opening which is connectable to a second supply source, at least a second lance for the injection of the mixture into the combustion chamber. The burner is operable in two distinct operating modes, a diffusive flame combustion mode and a premixed flame combustion mode.
Abstract:
Raw material feed into an electric arc furnace (“EAF”) is melted into heated liquid metal at a controlled temperature with impurities and inclusions removed as a separate liquid slag layer. The heated liquid metal is removed from the EAF into a passively heatable ladle wherein it is moved into a refining station where they are placed into a inductively heated refining holding vessel and wherein vacuum oxygen decarburization is applied to remove carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and other undesirable impurities from the liquid metal. The ladle and liquid metal is then transferred to a refining station/gas atomizer having a controlled vacuum and inert atmosphere wherein the liquid metal is poured from an inductively heated atomizing holder vessel into a heated tundish at a controlled rate wherein high pressure inert gas is applied through a nozzle to create a spray of metal droplets forming spherical shapes as the droplets that cool and fall into a bottom formed in the chamber. Spherical powder comprising the droplets are removed from the chamber through screen and blenders and then classified by size.
Abstract:
A process and plant for preheating a metal charge fed in continuous to an electric melting furnace through a preheating tunnel provided with side walls, a vault and a horizontal conveyor, wherein the metal charge is enveloped in countercurrent by fumes or exhaust gases exiting from the electric melting furnace, includes causing an air intake from the surrounding environment through openings along the preheating tunnel to complete the combustion of the fumes or exhaust gases. The intake is regulated by acting on suction fans and/or on the openings, based on measurements by temperature sensors and/or the composition of the outgoing gases in or downstream of the terminal part of the tunnel. The metal charge is enveloped by jets of gas ejected through a plurality of nozzles arranged non-uniformly longitudinally on the vault of the tunnel, with a greater concentration on the top of the vault of the tunnel.
Abstract:
A process and a plant for preheating a metal charge fed in continuous to an electric melting furnace through a preheating tunnel provided with a horizontal conveyor, wherein the metal charge is hit, in countercurrent, by the exhaust fumes or gas leaving the electric melting furnace and by jets of gas ejected through a plurality of nozzles positioned on the hood of the tunnel. The nozzles are arranged in groups interspaced from each other in a longitudinal direction with respect to the tunnel, and generate a small-scale turbulence or inject small fast gas jets that can penetrate the main gas stream passing through the preheating tunnel, and simultaneously generate a “horseshoe vortex” structure composed of a descending central gas flow (“downwash”), and ascending flows (“upwash”) close to the side walls of the preheating tunnel, which enable a desidered circulation of the gases.
Abstract:
A method for the production of cast iron starting from pre-reduced iron ore (DRI) with an electric arc furnace includes the steps of preparing a charge of pre-reduced iron ore DRI having a metallization higher than 90% and containing over 2.8% by weight of carbon, wherein at least 80% of the carbon is combined with the iron to form iron carbide Fe3C; charging the charge of pre-reduced iron ore into the electric arc furnace; and melting the DRI charge to form liquid cast iron having at least 80% by weight of actual carbon content deriving from the carbon in the charge of pre-reduced iron ore, the melting step being in a reducing atmosphere and in a melting chamber of the electric arc furnace subjected to a positive internal pressure generated by the gases produced by reduction reactions that develop during melting.
Abstract:
A positioning of a spindle with micrometric forwarding control and tilting of its rotation axis includes a spindle shaft rotatingly supported inside rotatable supports, wherein the rotatable supports include two spherical elements having housings which are eccentric with respect to the rotation axis that join the centers of the spheres, and wherein the two spherical elements are positioned in a cylindrical housing having at least two parts, and wherein two rotation elements are connected to the two spherical elements and cause their independent rotation.