REDUCTION OF IRON ORE PELLETS BY STATISTICAL DESIGN OF EXPERIMENTS

Generation of iron ore fines needs sintering and pelletization before its being used in blast furnace /iron ore reduction. Further huge deposit of non coking coal has compelled Iron and Steel Industries to use these coals after gasification. Carbon dioxide gas coming out as flue gas is source of air pollution. In the present study, an attempt has been made to study the reduction behavior of CO/ CO2 produced after gasification of high ash non coking coal with flue gas coming out from a furnace under isothermal condition through statistical design of experiments. It was observed that degree of reduction increases with increase in temperature, time and concentration of CO in CO/CO2 mixture. Temperature has strongest effect followed by time and concentration of CO in CO/CO2 mixture. The produced syn gas is used for smelting purpose then flux requirement to the process will be decreased because the ash of coal will not enter into the smelting furnace. In this way high ash non coking coal will be used in iron and steel industry for reduction and smelting purpose