Recently, CCIN reporters heard of such a new trend - some domestic enterprises engaged in coal chemical industry and smelting, are considering the project of coal-to-gas production of sponge iron. According to preliminary understanding, there are as many as 20 companies that have this plan. There are no major problems in the process. According to the reporter's understanding, as early as 1997, the Yannan Mining Lunan Fertilizer Plant and Baosteel Group Co., Ltd. jointly conducted exploration of coal gas production sponge iron. At that time, the two companies combined the Texaco coal-water slurry pressure gasification technology with the direct reduction shaft furnace technology and jointly developed the "BL method for the production of sponge iron semi-industrial test equipment" experimental project. After tests, the device has consistently produced 93 tons of qualified sponge iron products for 20 consecutive days. The average metallization rate has reached 93.04%, and the technical indicators have reached the advanced level of similar domestic and international devices. This device is the world's first coal gasification technology used to produce sponge iron.
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What is sponge iron? What are the advantages of coal gas production sponge iron? Is this product and technology mature? Is there a future? The reporter took these questions and interviewed some industry experts.
What is a technology that can benefit sponge iron in both industries? An industry source told reporters that sponge iron, also known as direct reduced iron, is the product of a reduction reaction of coal or gas and iron ore at non-melting temperatures. As the iron ore is reduced to form a large number of pores, it looks like a sponge under the microscope, hence its name. Sponge iron can be used as raw material for steelmaking, especially raw materials for smelting high-quality steel and special steel.
Zhang Youping, a senior engineer at Baosteel Group Research Institute, told reporters that sponge iron can not only be used directly as a raw material for steelmaking converters, but also sponge iron is a pure source of iron with less impurities and can process special steel, high-purity steel, casting and forging blanks. Can sell the price, the added value is very high.
The so-called coal gas production of sponge iron means that the reducing gas (carbon monoxide and hydrogen) produced after the coal gasification is sent to the shaft furnace to undergo a reduction reaction with the iron ore to generate sponge iron.
A number of industry experts told CCIN reporters that coal-to-gas production of sponge iron is a production project that can benefit both chemical and metallurgical industries.
First, it will help increase the added value of the metallurgical industry.
At present, China's annual steel production capacity has exceeded 800 million tons, but the structure of steel products is very unreasonable. This is reflected in the surplus of low value-added Pu-Steel, and high-end products such as cars and household appliances, as well as stainless steel, die steel, etc., need to be imported in large quantities every year.
The production of high-grade steel products requires the use of sponge iron. However, China's sponge iron has a large market gap. At present, the annual output of sponge iron in the world is more than 70 million tons, but the output in China is less than 1 million tons, and 80% of the sponge iron that China imports annually. Therefore, starting in 2009, China has included sponge iron production technology in the list of imported technology projects.
At present, domestic sponge iron production process is divided into gas-based and coal-based two major categories. The coal-based method has high investment, high production costs, and poor indicators. It has been listed as a backward process that is banned within a time limit. The gas-based method has the advantages of mature production technology, large output, and low product cost. It is highly competitive, but natural gas is required as a reducing agent, and development is limited by the gas source and region.
In this case, the cost of coal-to-gas production of sponge iron technology is lower than that of natural gas, and it is not limited by gas sources and regions. It is an important choice for the development of high value-added products in the metallurgical industry. In the recently introduced "12th Five-Year Plan" for the steel industry, non-blast furnace ironmaking technology including coal-gas-making sponge iron is one of the projects encouraged by the state.
Li Yulin, an engineer at China Metallurgical Southern Engineering Technology Co., Ltd., one of the three major iron and steel design institutes of the Ministry of Metallurgical Industry, said that the sponge iron circulating in the domestic market is produced by the tunnel kiln tank reduction method with slow speed, low production, and coal production. Gas production sponge iron can combine metallurgical technology and chemical technology to promote the large-scale production of sponge iron.
Second, it is conducive to opening up new areas of coal chemical industry.
At present, China's traditional coal chemical products such as coke, synthetic ammonia, calcium carbide, methanol and other excesses are serious. The planned new coal chemical products such as coal-to-olefins, coal-to-oil, coal-to-natural gas, and coal-to-ethylene glycol also tend to be surplus. According to the statistical data of the China Petrochemical Federation, China's traditional coal chemical industry has an excess capacity of more than 30%, and the new coal chemical industry also has the problem of overheated investment.
The coal gas production sponge iron has opened up a new product line for coal chemical companies. A person in charge of Tianjin Ovol Metallurgical Technology Consulting Co., Ltd. introduced to the CCIN reporter that China's coal gasification technology has matured. The use of coal gasification technology to produce sponge iron, which for coal chemical companies, has opened up new product areas, which can avoid the oversupply of public companies to a certain product.
“We are engaged in coal chemical industry and have the advantage of coal gasification. We also have iron ore locally in Shandong, which has the advantage of raw materials. Therefore, we want to develop coal gas to produce sponge iron. This project is currently done in China is still relatively small, not It is prone to excess.†Lin Huazhao, deputy general manager of Shandong Ruixing Chemical Group, who is conducting a demonstration of the coal gas production sponge iron project, told reporters.
However, although semi-industrial test equipment was successful at the time, but after more than 10 years, the device did not bear fruit, so that coal gas production of sponge iron in our country is still blank. Why is this?
According to experts, the problem of cost and raw materials could not be solved.
Zhou Yusheng, a senior engineer of the original Baosteel Group Co., Ltd. who participated in the construction of the test device that year, said that the main reason was that coal gas costs were high at the time. He told CCIN that according to the plan at that time, if the cost of reducing gas reached 0.5 yuan/m3, large-scale production would be carried out. However, the cost per cubic meter of coal gas at that time reached 1 yuan and the cost was too high.
Zhang Youping also stated that at the time, through the overall economic evaluation of the entire experimental device, they found that the production cost was higher than that of imported products and other domestic production methods, and there was no good economics, so the project was suspended.
Academician Lu Wenwen, assistant to the general manager of the China National Coal and Coal Chemical Engineering Research Center who participated in the construction of the experimental facility, introduced to the CCIN, the Lunan Fertilizer Plant of Yanzhou Mine had also made a feasibility report of 1 million tons of sponge iron annually. Finally, it was also stranded due to high production costs.
Yan Fengtian, a senior engineer in charge of coal gas production sponge iron plant in Lunan Fertilizer Plant of Yanzhou, told reporters in the year that the requirements of raw materials for the experimental equipment were very demanding and required high granularity and grade of iron ore. Lu Wenwen further explained that the installation has a strong selectivity for raw iron ore. At that time, they used a variety of ore from Brazil, Sweden, and other countries to conduct experiments. Only one type of ore had the best effect. Zhou Shengsheng also stated that coal-fired gas production of sponge iron requires high grades of iron ore for raw materials, and the iron content generally exceeds 67%.
Zhang Youping told reporters that China's iron ore resources are dominated by poor iron ore, high-grade iron ore, and a small amount of natural rich ore, with a grade of only about 60%. At that time, there was basically no large-scale rich ore mining base that could be directly used for sponge iron production in China. However, if ordinary ore was carefully selected, the production cost would increase. He also stated that at present, Tianjin-based coal-based rotary kiln direct reduction sponge iron production plants use foreign ore raw materials, which have high production costs and are constrained by raw materials.
So now whether the coal-to-gas production sponge iron project that was launched will solve these two bottlenecks?
A number of experts told CCIN that the current coal gasification technology is relatively mature and has long-term experience. The cost of coal gas has been significantly reduced compared to the time before, and it has reached 0.5 yuan/m3, which can basically meet the needs of the project.
Another raw material problem also has the hope of solution. Some experts pointed out that although China's mineral resources are few in natural rich mines, but with the improvement of China's geological prospecting and ore selection, iron ore concentrates discovered in new exploration in recent years (by crushing, grinding, beneficiation and other processing and processing of ore-forming powder The iron ore resources are more abundant. According to available data, iron ore concentrates in Hebei, Liaoning, Heilongjiang and other regions all meet the requirements. Tao Jiangshan, manager of Tianjin Aowo Metallurgical Technology Consulting Co., Ltd., believes that iron ore concentrates in some areas of China can be selected to the required grades, but further research on the production process is needed.
The best combination of the two industries Although coal-fired gas production sponge iron is no longer a problem in the process technology, but many experts have warned that the project is not suitable for a single industry alone, preferably by the chemical companies and metallurgical companies joint projects, This is conducive to their respective advantages.
Tao Jiangshan explained to reporters that the coal-to-gas production of sponge iron has a large investment, and a reasonable economic scale investment also costs more than 3 billion yuan, which is too costly. Therefore, the joint venture helps to share risks.
Zhou Yusheng believes that coal prices are also an important factor influencing the production cost of sponge iron. The coal-to-gas production of sponge iron projects from Shangma requires high coal prices. If the coal price is 200-300 yuan/ton, the cost advantage is most obvious. Therefore, whether the raw material cost is competitive, whether or not it can obtain the cheap main raw material coal and iron ore is the key to the success or failure of the coal gas production sponge iron project. Coal chemical enterprises generally have coal resources, and metallurgical enterprises have iron ore resources. If coal chemical companies and metallurgical enterprises are jointly constructed, this can not only reduce investment costs, but also avoid finding outlets for products, which can solve market channel problems, and can also avoid In the development of the market, due to bargaining, the market price is reduced and the economics of the device are affected.
Zhang Honglin, chief engineer of the National Coal Water Slurry Gasification Research Center, also stated that the coal gas production sponge iron project is suitable for chemical companies and steel companies to do joint work locally, and is not suitable for individual coal chemical companies because of the high temperature of the restored sponge iron. The heat is high. If it is transported to the iron and steel companies for a long distance, much energy will not be used.
Some experts also pointed out that the coal-to-gas production of sponge iron projects involves chemical and metallurgical industries. There are still some problems in the middle of technology convergence and cooperation. This will be solved by the two industries. 
