Search for Articles:
Title / Keyword
Author / Affiliation / Email
Journal
Article Type
 
 
Advanced Search
 
Section
Special Issue
Volume
Issue
Number
Page
 
4.4
2.9
Journals
Metals
Special Issues
Reuse and Recycling of By-Products in the Steel Sector
share announcement

Reuse and Recycling of By-Products in the Steel Sector

A special issue of Metals (ISSN 2075-4701). This special issue belongs to the section "Extractive Metallurgy".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 September 2023) | Viewed by 8649

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Valentina Colla

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
TeCIP Institute, Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna, 56124 Pisa, Italy
Interests: metallurgy; steel; modelling; simulation; sustainability; circular economy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Teresa Annunziata Branca

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna, TeCIP Institute, 56124 Pisa, Italy
Interests: steelmaking; industrial sustainability; environmental impact
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The concept of a circular economy encourages resource efficiency with the target of sustainable development. A circular economy aims at achieving the maximum valorization of resources through product design, recovery and reuse, remanufacturing and recycling, and the zero-waste goal, based on the full use of raw materials and by-products, as well as landfill reduction. The steel industry is an integral part of the global circular economy and is committed to waste  minimization for improving the socio-economic and environmental sustainability of the steel production cycle.

Iron and steelmaking by-products are produced in parallel to the production of a primary product or as consequence of it. Over the last few decades, their use has significantly increased as a result of the development of innovative technologies improving the quality of recovered materials, and thanks also to synergies with other industrial sectors.

The main solid by-products are slags, dust, and sludge, while process gases from coke ovens, blast furnaces, and basic oxygen furnaces are also important by-products because of their energetic and chemical contents. Slags represent about 90%, by mass, of all solid by-products, and in Europe, they can be used as cement, concrete additives, road construction, metallurgical use, hydraulic engineering, fertilizer, interim storage, and landfill.

The by-products of the steel sector can be reused not only internally, but also externally, in other industries and in wider society, thanks to their physical and chemical properties. In addition, valuable non-ferrous metals can be recovered from many of them.

The use of iron and steelmaking by-products aims at improving the material efficiency rate and reducing energy and emissions, and contributes to the circular economy. The main goal is to achieve the 100% efficient use of raw materials and zero-waste in the sector. The use of by-products increases resource efficiency, prevents landfill waste, reduces CO2 emissions, and generates revenues.

This Special Issue is focused on new technologies, processes, and solutions for a sustainable valorization of by-products and residues coming from the steel sector. Contributions are expected to cover topics related to technologies and practices for residue reuse and valorization, and/or at least one of the three main dimensions of sustainable development (i.e., environmental, economic, and social), by taking into account barriers and related solutions for residue management and valorization. In addition, this Special Issue aims at covering the exploitation of the solutions and the synergies with other industrial sectors, according to the concepts of circular economy and industrial symbiosis.

Prof. Dr. Valentina Colla
Dr. Teresa Annunziata Branca
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Metals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Circular economy
  • Industrial symbiosis
  • New technologies for improving by-products reuse
  • Increase of resource efficiency
  • Reuse, recycling, and recovery of iron and steel slags
  • Blast furnace slag use in cement sector
  • Steelmaking slag use in road construction
  • Steelmaking slag use in soil improvement
  • Slags use for agriculture purposes
  • Process gases use in heat and electricity production
  • Internal and external use of dust and sludge
  • Use of petrochemicals from cokemaking
  • Internal reuse of emulsions from mills and used oil • Reuse of process gases from the coke oven, blast furnace, and basic oxygen furnace
  • Optimization of energy sources
  • Optimization strategies for minimizing waste and improving by-product recovery
  • Prevent landfill waste
  • Digital tools supporting by products reuse, recycling, and valorization
  • Economic viability of iron and steelmaking by-products use
  • Legislative aspects for international/regional quality standards of by-products
  • Legislative requirements for by-products use
  • Social aspects related to improved by-product reuse and recycling, such as skill gaps, training paths for personnel upskilling, and tools to support workers’ capabilities and awareness

Published Papers (4 papers)

Download All Papers
Order results
Result details
Show export options expand_more Show export options expand_less
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

Jump to: Review

13 pages, 2885 KiB  
Article
Recovery of Valuable Materials with the RecoDust Process
by Wolfgang Reiter, Johannes Rieger, Harald Raupenstrauch, Luigi Cattini, Nikolay Maystrenko, Denis Kovalev, Alekseyev Alexey and Artem Mitrofanov
Metals 2023, 13(7), 1191; https://doi.org/10.3390/met13071191 - 27 Jun 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 891
Abstract
The RecoDust process is a pyrometallurgical process for treating steel mill dusts that cannot be recycled internally due to their zinc content, providing numerous benefits compared to conventional processes. State-of-the-art processes often face the problem of recycling only zinc, but not iron, which [...] Read more.
The RecoDust process is a pyrometallurgical process for treating steel mill dusts that cannot be recycled internally due to their zinc content, providing numerous benefits compared to conventional processes. State-of-the-art processes often face the problem of recycling only zinc, but not iron, which is frequently landfilled and withdrawn from a closed loop. Furthermore, these processes are also often limited to a specific zinc content in the feedstock. Within the described RecoDust smelting campaigns, basic oxygen converter dust with about 15 wt.% zinc was taken as feedstock. After high-temperature treatment of the input material, the RecoDust slag (RDS) has a zinc content of 0.4 wt.% and the crude zinc oxide (CZO) has a ZnO content of up to 80 wt.%. The RDS is suitable for use in the sinter plant as a secondary raw material. To investigate the influence of adding RDS to a common sintering mixture, sintering pot tests followed by RDI (reduction disintegration indices) tests were carried out. The influence of the admixture of RDS on the RDI values is not detectable. The CZO was fed into a soda extraction system for halogen removal. The halogen removal of this two-stage leaching was highly efficient with over 90% for chlorine. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Reuse and Recycling of By-Products in the Steel Sector)
►▼ Show Figures

Figure 1

16 pages, 6810 KiB  
Article
Utilization of Renewable Carbon in Electric Arc Furnace-Based Steel Production: Comparative Evaluation of Properties of Conventional and Non-Conventional Carbon-Bearing Sources
by Lina Kieush, Johannes Schenk, Andrii Koveria, Gerd Rantitsch, Andrii Hrubiak and Horst Hopfinger
Metals 2023, 13(4), 722; https://doi.org/10.3390/met13040722 - 06 Apr 2023
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 2669
Abstract
Conventional (anthracite, calcined petroleum coke, and coke) and non-conventional (biochar, and biocokes (3 wt.% torrefied wood, and 3 wt.% petroleum coke + 3 wt.% charcoal)) carbon-bearing sources have been studied for their use in electric arc furnace (EAF)-based steel production. Commonly, for the [...] Read more.
Conventional (anthracite, calcined petroleum coke, and coke) and non-conventional (biochar, and biocokes (3 wt.% torrefied wood, and 3 wt.% petroleum coke + 3 wt.% charcoal)) carbon-bearing sources have been studied for their use in electric arc furnace (EAF)-based steel production. Commonly, for the use of carbon sources in EAFs, one of the important properties is the content of fixed carbon, the release of volatiles as well as the elemental composition of inorganics. The properties of six carbon sources were analyzed by determining the proximate analysis, X-ray fluorescence analysis (XRF), coke reactivity index (CRI), and strength after reaction with CO2 (CSR), Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) specific surface area and Barrett–Joyner–Halenda (BJH) pore size and volume analysis, ash chemical analysis, optical and scanning microscopy, Raman spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis. The results indicate biocoke as a promising option to replace conventional carbon-bearing sources. In the sample set, the fixed carbon, volatiles, and ash content of the biocokes were similar despite the total difference in additives. Additionally, the use of additives did not significantly affect the biocoke reactivity indices, but slightly decreased the strength after the reaction with CO2. Carbon-bearing sources have been characterized in terms of their structural properties. XRD analysis revealed that the amount of disordered carbon increased in the order: coke < calcined petroleum coke ~ biocoke (3 wt.% torrefied wood) < biocoke (3 wt.% petroleum coke + 3 wt.% charcoal) < biochar. The results obtained on the physical, chemical, and structural properties of carbon sources are the basis for further research on the behavior of slag foaming. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Reuse and Recycling of By-Products in the Steel Sector)
►▼ Show Figures

Figure 1

17 pages, 3978 KiB  
Article
Utilisation of Mining Waste from the Steel Industry, Ladle Furnace Slags, as a Filler in Bituminous Mixtures of Continuous Grading
by Francisco Javier Nebreda-Rodrigo, Juan María Terrones-Saeta, Jorge Suárez-Macías, Evaristo Rafael Moreno-López, Francisco Antonio Corpas-Iglesias and Carmen Martínez-García
Metals 2021, 11(9), 1447; https://doi.org/10.3390/met11091447 - 13 Sep 2021
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1820
Abstract
Road construction is an activity that involves a large consumption of raw materials, with the consequent high environmental impact. For this reason, various research projects are being developed in which waste is used as a raw material for bituminous mixtures. This avoids the [...] Read more.
Road construction is an activity that involves a large consumption of raw materials, with the consequent high environmental impact. For this reason, various research projects are being developed in which waste is used as a raw material for bituminous mixtures. This avoids the extraction of raw materials, reduces the environmental impact and reduces greenhouse gas emissions. In this research, the incorporation of ladle furnace slag as a filler for continuous grading bituminous mixtures was evaluated. Firstly, the ladle furnace slag was chemically and physically characterised and its suitability for use as a filler was determined in accordance with the regulations. Subsequently, bituminous mixtures were conformed with the slag and also with commercial fillers, calcareous and hornfels, in order to compare the results. Finally, the physical properties, Marshall stability and the effect of water were determined with the immersion–compression test on all families of samples. The results showed that the mixes conformed with ladle furnace slag had higher Marshall stability, less variation due to the effect of water and acceptable physical properties. Consequently, the suitability of utilisation of these slags in bituminous mixtures could be confirmed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Reuse and Recycling of By-Products in the Steel Sector)
►▼ Show Figures

Figure 1

Review

Jump to: Research

26 pages, 4206 KiB  
Review
Future Research and Developments on Reuse and Recycling of Steelmaking By-Products
by Valentina Colla, Teresa Annunziata Branca, Roland Pietruck, Simon Wölfelschneider, Agnieszka Morillon, David Algermissen, Sara Rosendahl, Hanna Granbom, Umberto Martini and Delphine Snaet
Metals 2023, 13(4), 676; https://doi.org/10.3390/met13040676 - 29 Mar 2023
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1967
Abstract
In the steel sector, sustainable management of by-products is a key challenge to preserve natural resources and achieve the zero waste goal. In this paper, the main trends of future research and development on reuse and recycling of by-products of the steel industry [...] Read more.
In the steel sector, sustainable management of by-products is a key challenge to preserve natural resources and achieve the zero waste goal. In this paper, the main trends of future research and development on reuse and recycling of by-products of the steel industry are presented in the form of a roadmap, which is the outcome of a dissemination project funded by the European Union based on the analysis of the most relevant and recent European projects concerning reuse and recycling of by-products from the steel production cycle. In particular, the developed roadmap highlights the most important topics of future research activities and challenges related to reuse and recycling of by-products from the existing or alternative steelmaking routes. A time horizon of 10 years has been considered, taking into account the European Commission targets to achieve carbon neutrality in a circular economy context. In addition, current technological trends derived from past and ongoing research projects are analysed. Research needs are based on the main categories of by-products and residual materials. Due to the different pathways to reduce CO2 emissions, each category is divided into subcategories considering both current and novel process routes targeting decarbonization of steel production. This work identifies the most urgent and demanding research directions for the coming years based on a survey targeting the steel companies, services providers of the steel industry and research organizations active in the field. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Reuse and Recycling of By-Products in the Steel Sector)
►▼ Show Figures

Figure 1

Show export options expand_more Show export options expand_less
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:
 
Displaying articles 1-4
Back to TopTop