MXCOL®DRI Production - Coal Gas & COG Update

by Gary Metius and Todd Astoria

Publisher - Midrex Technologies, Inc.

Category - Engineering & IT

In the second quarter of 2011, the availability of subsidized natural gas to the steel industry in India dramatically changed. The decision meant that the JSW Steel DRI plant at Dolvi would have to reduce production by about 35% to avoid utilizing the natural gas priced at $12 / MMBtu. Normally, the JSW plant at Dolvi would produce 185 t/h of cold DRI from the reducing gas generated by reforming natural gas in a Midrex® Reformer. The question that quickly developed was what could be used to in place the higher cost natural gas to maintain the original production rate of 185 t/h. JSW had other facilities where alternate fuel sources were being used or considered. The JSW DRI plant at JSW Toranagallu was designed to use reducing gas from two COREX plants located at that facility. This plant will use an existing technology flowsheet practiced at ArcelorMittal South Africa, Saldanha plant, one of the coal gas options for producing DRI. Additionally, JSW was proposing to develop a DRI plant at JSW West Bengal where blast furnaces were currently operating and sufficient coke oven gas would be available following the expansion of the coke oven battery currently operating there. This would be a new technology using the MXCOL flowsheet with COG, coke oven gas, to produce the DRI. With these two coal based options in mind, JSW wanted to know if either could be used in an integrated operation with the Midrex Reformer at Dolvi. It was determined that the COG option would be the best for the Dolvi site, since there was already an operating blast furnace at Dolvi, that could use the coke, and the DRI plant could use the COG as a reducing gas source to displace some of the natural gas. As a result, a coke oven battery was constructed at Dolvi to supply up to 40,000 Nm3/h of COG for use in the DRI plant operations.

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