Green, low-carbon and intelligent lead the transformation and upgrading of the steel industry

In addition, strengthening the recycling of scrap steel resources and improving the ratio of converter scrap is an important way to reduce carbon emissions in the steel industry, and short-process electric furnace steelmaking has become the first choice under the trend of transformation and upgrading of this process technology. Short-process electric furnace steelmaking can directly shorten the process from sintering to blast furnace ironmaking, and then to converter steelmaking. It is estimated that a single electric furnace can achieve carbon emission reduction of 70%-80% and save comprehensive energy consumption of 45%-50%. In recent years, MCC South has laid out in advance in this field, reserved its strength for technological exploration and updating, and successively implemented five quantum electric furnace projects.

Based on the advantages of simplifying the production process, reducing the rolling process and improving the yield rate, near-final continuous casting and rolling technology also help to reduce the carbon emission in the steel production process. As early as a few years ago, MCC South carried out continuous exploration and innovation in the field of technology, and promoted the iterative upgrading of efficient continuous casting technology. From 2019 to 2021, relying on Yangchun New Iron and Steel billet continuous casting machine and Fujian Sansteel 3# continuous casting machine project, the pulling speed test was carried out, and the pulling speed of billet continuous casting was successfully promoted to 6.02 m/min, which reached a new high in China. It can completely realize that the billet casting billet is directly sent into the rolling mill without heating furnace, eliminating the heating furnace process, and reducing the energy consumption of rolling steel up to 60%-70%.

ESP headless continuous casting and rolling production line, which represents the highest level of hot-rolled strip technology in the world today, can realize the "hot instead of cold" of some products, saving about 66% of energy consumption per ton compared with conventional rolling, and saving energy and reducing carbon. MCC South has taken the lead in carrying out engineering technology practice in this field. At present, there are a total of 8 ESP production lines in the world, and 5 of the 7 domestic production lines are contracted by MCC South.

Deepen the reform of the energy structure and take multiple measures to promote the low-carbon transition

The energy structure of traditional iron and steel enterprises is mainly carbon-based (coal). To achieve green and low carbon, the existing energy structure must be adjusted and optimized. As early as 2011, MCC South passed the approval of the Ministry of Science and Technology, established the "National Steel Production Energy Efficiency Optimization Engineering Technology Research Center", and took the lead in undertaking the national 863 program project "Metallurgical industry system energy efficiency monitoring, evaluation and optimization control technology and system". Carried out hundreds of consulting projects such as capacity identification and energy consumption analysis of iron and steel enterprises in Hubei Province, energy conservation and environmental protection planning of iron and steel joint enterprises, presided over the drafting of dozens of national and industry standards for industrial energy conservation and green environmental protection, and successfully selected the National Ministry of Industry and Information Technology "Industrial Energy Conservation and green Development Evaluation Center" in 2017. Fully equipped with the technical strength of energy-saving and green planning, consulting, design and optimization of the whole process of the metallurgical industry and even the industrial industry.

In recent years, MCC South has been committed to promoting the innovation and reform of the energy structure of steel production, focusing on energy reduction, reuse and resource utilization, reducing coal use by reducing the total amount of coal and coke used in blast furnaces and substituting clean energy, and actively developing recycling efficiency improvement technologies for waste heat and energy in steel production processes, so as to achieve different degrees of reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

Replacing carbon with hydrogen (coal) is an important direction of current low-carbon development and energy reform. Starting from the positive response to the hydrogen energy strategic requirements of the national clean energy industry, MCC South actively carries out the storage and research of hydrogen energy technology, and is researching and developing serialized technology project groups such as hydrogen-rich blast furnace smelting and low-carbon blast furnace technology based on the low-carbon process route. In blast furnace smelting, the use of high hydrogen carbon ratio raw materials to partially replace coke or pulverized coal, and partially realize the conversion of carbon metallurgy to hydrogen metallurgy, not only can improve the production efficiency of the blast furnace, but also can reduce about 10% of the blast furnace carbon dioxide emissions.