Current Position::The World First Non-ferrous Metal Slag Recycle Demonstration Project Put into Production by Shenwu Energy Saving Company Limited to Lead the World Clean Smelting Technology Transformation
The President of Shenwu Energy Saving Company Limited, Dr. Wu Daohong gives speech.
Xinhua Net Beijing reported on Dec 30th, 2016 that on Dec 29th, 2016, Shenwu Energy Saving Company Limited (hereinafter referred to Shenwu Energy Saving) in Beijing released three subversive clean smelting technologies - " Clean Smelting of Direct Reduction of Regenerative Rotary Furnace (SRF)", "Clean Smelting of Direct Reduction of Hydrogen Shaft Furnace (SHSF)” and "Smelting of Regenerative Gas Smelting Furnace (SRGS)", and announced that the world's first non-ferrous metal slag recycle demonstration project (hereinafter referred to as Jinchuan Project) developed and designed independently by Shenwu Energy Saving formally put into operation in Jinchang City of Gansu Province.
Mr. Wu Daohong, the president of Shenwu Energy Saving said the three core technologies giving disruptive changes to the existing traditional production methods from process perspective, resolving the problem of high energy consumption, heavy pollution, poor economy and low resource utilization, which could be called as industry "pain points"; breaking the technical difficulty of solid waste smelting of low grade ore, composite associated ore and non-ferrous metal (hereinafter referred to: solid waste), which will lead technology and process transformation of the global steel and nonferrous metal industry. The successful putting into operation of Jinchuan Project, that is the mark of Shenwu Energy Saving to overcome the world's problem of solid waste treatment of steel and non-ferrous metal, through recycle turning environmental waste to treasure, to provide high efficiency, low-cost, and sustainable solutions for the solid waste comprehensive utilization of global iron and nonferrous metal, with high economic, environmental and social benefits.
Slag Accumulation Becomes the Environmental Chronic Illness; the "Alchemy" of Shenwu Energy Saving Turns Waste into Treasure
Copper tailing is copper smelting slag after the selection of copper. One ton crude copper produces about 2 tons of tailings. According to incomplete statistics, the global and China's annual copper tailings are about 36 million tons and 16 million tons; the historical cumulant is as high as 300 million tons and 130 million tons. The copper tailing not only causes the resource loss of iron, zinc and other valuable metal, also causes serious pollution to groundwater, soil and air.
The Jinchuan project uses the process of “Clean Smelting of Direct Reduction of Regenerative Rotary Furnace (SRF)” developed by Shenwu Energy Saving, to utilize copper tailings to produce pig iron, zinc oxide, construction materials and steam. The total investment of phase I is 1.08 billion Yuan, the annual handling of copper tailings is 800,000 tons, with outputting 276,000 tons of iron, 34,000 tons of zinc oxide powder, and 449,000 tons of outgoing steam, the annual after-tax net profit could reach 210 million Yuan, and investment pay-back period is 4.1 years. At present, all the indicators of Jinchuan project meet the assessment requirements, the metallization rate reaches 90%, the grade of recovered zinc oxide powder reaches 65%, the iron grade reaches above 87%, There is no sewage efflux during production, the exhaust gas, solid waste, and noise etc. meet emission standards.
As the world's first copper tailings recycling demonstration production line, the successful putting into production of Jinchuan Project not only marks the breakthrough of clean smelting technology in copper tailings recycling of Shenwu Energy Saving, also opens up a new way for large-scale comprehensive utilization of waste slag and tailings of steel and nonferrous metal smelting.
Data shows that there is serious accumulation of steel and nonferrous metal smelting slag and tailings in China, with the accumulated solid waste more than 500 million tons, and only in 2015, the increased solid waste in iron and non-ferrous metal industry upto 180 million ton. Taking iron content in solid waste for example, 70 million ton/a iron can be recovered, accounting for 10% of annual demand for iron in China; taking zinc content in solid waste for example, 1.6 million ton/ a zinc oxide can be recovered, accounting for 28% of annual demand in China. China's "13th Five-Year Plan" proposes to vigorously promote the comprehensive utilization of bulk solid waste and tailings, to adapt to building a resource-saving and environment-friendly society. But the solid waste treatment is facing the problems of high difficulty in treatment; low use efficiency, high energy consumption, serious pollution and poor economy, which the traditional process cannot effectively treat at all.
The new clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving, gives disruptive changes to the existing traditional production methods from process perspective, to achieve turning waste into treasure. At present, the large-scale pilot study results of the technology adopted in Jinchuan Project have passed the identification of scientific and technological achievements organized by China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association, identifying that the process and equipment test technology in this project has reached the international advanced level, and suggesting that it should be promoted in fast step in similar domestic smelting enterprises, to attribute to energy-saving emission, comprehensive utilization of resources and air pollution control in China's heavy industry and heavy chemical industry.
Relevant experts said that China is a large mineral consumption country, with high dependence on external. With the future economic growth, mineral consumption will continue to increase. As non-renewable natural resources, China's development and utilization of mineral resources must take the road of circular economy, to achieve mineral resources from the limited to the unlimited transformation. It requires breakthrough in technology, capital, and policy bottlenecks to make resources from solid waste and tailings. The technology breakthroughs and industrial production of Shenwu Energy Saving, will provide an important technical and industry support for China's solid waste pollution control, protection of national mineral resources, and sustainable development.
Resolving the Industry "Pain Point" to Lead the Global Smelting Technology Change
Steel and non-ferrous metals industry is strategic and basic industry for the development of the national economy. In 2015, the sales of steel and non-ferrous metals reached 13 trillion Yuan, accounting for 20% of China's GDP. At present, China's steel and non-ferrous metals industry is in a development predicament of overcapacity and serious losses. High pollution, high energy consumption, low utilization of resources and poor economy becomes the pain of the industry.
The data shows that in 2015 the loss of China's steel industry is upto 50.5%, and loss of non-ferrous metal industry is upto 23%. Taking the air pollutants in Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei province as example, the emission from the steel and non-ferrous metal industries is 49% of the total smoke dust, 24% of the sulfur dioxide and 22% of the nitrogen oxides. Nickel, vanadium, titanium, chromium and other important metal production in China also face the difficulties of extraction, high cost, high pollution, and high power consumption etc.
Whether from the enterprise profit and development perspective, or to meet the national and industry-related environmental requirements, new technology and process are needed urgently to break through the development predicament. "Only disruptive technology can fundamentally solve industry problems to achieve clean production and green manufacturing." Dr. Wu said.
It is understood that the traditional black smelting technology use coke and high grade ore as raw material, and use coke, anthracite, semi-coke and electricity as fuel, with scarce raw materials and high cost; the clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving use ordinary coal, low grade ore, and composite associated mine as raw material, and use ordinary coal and its gas as fuel, which greatly improve the utilization of resources and reduce production costs. Compared the two kinds of technologies, the three subversive clean smelting technologies of Shenwu Energy Saving have the advantages of energy efficiency, reducing pollutants and carbon emissions, multi-element synergistic extraction, resource recycling and comprehensive utilization etc., resolving the problem of healthy and sustainable development of iron and non-ferrous metals industry. The successful production of Jinchuan Project marked the verification of the clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving in industrial production once again.
Taking the technology of “Clean Smelting of Direct Reduction of Regenerative Rotary Furnace (SRF)” as example, compared with the traditional smelting technology, there is no coke, sintering, blast furnace and other high energy consumption and high pollution equipment, not needing coking coal, only needing ordinary coal as raw material; by coupling of regenerative combustion technology and direct reduction technology, with ordinary coal as reducing agent and by-product carbon monoxide as fuel supplement, with low temperature reaction and low energy consumption; using the international leading regenerative combustion technology to use low calorific value fuel, the heat utilization rate of furnace more than 86%, the heat utilization rate of system more than 94%, energy saving 25% compared with the traditional rotary kiln process, and reducing air pollutants and carbon dioxide emissions; blast furnace iron making requires the rich ore with iron content more than 60%, while SRF technology can handle a variety of low-grade ore, composite associated mine, rare and non-ferrous metal ore and chromic slag, with wide adaptability of raw material; SRF can extract efficiently the iron resources in complex raw materials, but also can achieve the synergistic extraction and high-value utilization of vanadium, titanium, nickel, zinc, potassium and other elements.
In the 300,000 t/a solid waste comprehensive treatment project of Jiangsu Shagang Group, which adopts the SRF technology, compared with the traditional rotary kiln process, the clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving can contribute 25% reduction in energy consumption, 25% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, 70% reduction in sulfur dioxide emissions, 67% reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions, 45% reduction in production cost, and after-tax profit of the year was more than 90 million Yuan.
The technology “Clean Smelting of Direct Reduction of Hydrogen Shaft Furnace” is suitable for the production of high quality steel, special steel and clean steel, particular for the vanadium and titanium smelting. The titanium resource recovery rate can reach above 95%, solving the world problem of difficulty in using vanadium-titanium magnetite. The traditional process of vanadium-titanium smelting needs high cost of production, also the recovery of titanium resources is zero, wasting precious titanium resources widely needed by aerospace, deep-sea and chemical industries. By using the clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving, the production cost of titanium dioxide can be reduced by 37%, the production cost of titanium sponge is reduced by more than 10% and the production cost of vanadium is reduced by 15%. This will greatly expand the application space of titanium and vanadium resources and accelerate the development of China and global metal consumption into the titanium and vanadium era.
At present, the three clean smelting technologies of Shenwu Energy Saving have entered a large-scale promotion and application stage, beginning to enter the high energy consumption and high pollution industry of global iron and nonferrous mineral resources and its solid waste. The technological transformation space of China's black and non-ferrous metal industry will reach 3.2 trillion Yuan, after the transformation, more than 200 million tons of standard coal can be saved each year, 250 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions can be reduced, and the increased economic benefit can be more than 300 billion Yuan; 2 billion tons of low-grade ore, 110 million tons of lateritic nickel ore, 40 million tons of vanadium and titanium ore, 10.5 million tons of chromites, and 180 million tons of solid waste of all kinds of black and non-ferrous metal can be treated in each year. The global market space is more immeasurable.
Doctor Wu Daohong mentioned that the clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving provides international leading, mature and reliable technical solutions for quality upgrading, promoting supply-side reform, and environmental pollution reduction in China's steel and nonferrous metals industry. At the same time, the technology can make use of China’s large number of low-grade ores, composite associated mine, bulk solid waste and tailings etc., thereby to reduce China's dependence on imported ores and protect the national mineral resources security. "Only by use of the clean smelting technology of Shenwu Energy Saving, nickel, titanium, vanadium, indium, germanium and other metals can be extracted in large scale and high efficiency, the air pollution can be reduced from the source to address global climate change, and green development and sustainable development goals can be realized. "Dr. Wu said.