Russia-based Metalloinvest has announced the completion of the modernization of electric arc furnaces (EAFs) modernization at its subsidiary Ural Steel within the scope of its strategic development project.
Tenova, an Italian company specialized in innovative solutions for the metals and mining industry, provided Ural Steel with the unique Flexible Modular Furnace (FMF) technology, that allows the production of steel to use a converter method without electrodes or requiring electric energy. The FMF furnace can use any charge components (hot metal, pig iron, HBI, scrap) with the option of increasing its share to 85 percent. The advantages of FMF technology include the use of energy created by a chemical reaction to melt the solid part of the charge, which reduces energy consumption and minimizes waste gas emissions.
“Metalloinvest invested almost 1.1 billion roubles in this project. Switching to the newest FMF technology will reduce the environmental impact of Ural Steel’s production while increasing its efficiency”, Andrey Varichev, CEO of Management Company Metalloinvest, stated.
The pilot run of the furnaces was in 2019, with EAF No. 2 launched in February that year and EAF No. 1 launched in September. Since then, the furnaces have produced over 600,000 mt of high-quality steel.