Ferroalloys Manufacturing is a highly power-intensive process. Power cost contributes to more than 30% of the cost of production of Ferro Alloys. We are looking for solutions for reducing specific smelting power consumption in ferroalloy production.
Ferroalloys are alloys of iron and one or more alloying elements such as Chromium, Manganese, Silicon & Nickle etc. Ferroalloys are used as master alloys in the iron and steel industry to improve the properties of steel, especially the tensile strength, wear and corrosion resistance of steel.
In our plant, we make Ferro-Chrome (FeCr) and Ferro- Manganese (FeMn) alloys. Electric Arc Furnaces (EAF) are used to make these alloys from raw materials. The overview of the ferroalloy production process is shown in fig 1, and a typical electric arc furnace is shown in fig 2.
Ferroalloy production is an energy-intensive process. The energy needed per ton varies depending upon the product. For FeCr around 3.52 MWh/T FeCr is required while in case of High Carbon FeMn the requirement is around 2.76 MWh/T FeMn. The energy in ferroalloy production is consumed mostly (>90%) by Electric Arc Furnaces (EAF), which are submerged EAF and are in continuous operation.
We are looking for solutions to reduce the energy consumption/cost in ferroalloy production, especially, reduction in power consumed by Electric Arc Furnaces. The proposed solutions should reduce the power consumption by a minimum of 20 kWh/T (FeCr or FeMn) over a sustained period of a minimum of 3 months.
We have tried the following options earlier:
The proposed solutions should meet the following requirements: