Brazilian miner and iron ore producer Vale has successfully tested in a large scale a biochar that can replace the mineral coal it uses in the production of iron ore pellets, according to a media report by Reuters late this week.
Vale told Reuters the company’s pelletizing unit near São Luís produced 57,000 mt of pellets in a process in which biochar represented 25 percent of the total coal used. The media report noted Vale now plans to potentially replace all coal it uses in 12 pellet plants, 11 in Brazil and one in Oman, with biochar. That way, it will reduce emissions by 16 percent. Vale plans to conduct another test using 50 percent biochar, and test 100 percent in 2022.
“Our goal for 2022 is to test the technical feasibility of further increasing the share of biochar used in the furnace,” Rodrigo Boyer, a Vale engineer leading the project said in the report.