Magnezit Group and Chelyabinsk Zinc Plant carry out a project for recycling steelmaking waste and producing zinc concentrate

Magnezit Group jointly with Chelyabinsk Zinc Plant JSC (CZP) have started implementing a project for utilization and reprocessing of Electric Arc Furnace Dust (EAF). The result will be production of concentrate (Waelz oxide) with zinc content of up to 60% which will be processed at zinc plants with production of metal zinc and metallized pellets for use in EAF steelmaking or blast furnace production. The project is implemented by the enterprise Ural Recycling established on parity basis.

‘Utilization of Russian metallurgy enterprises’ waste is among the most promising directions of further development of the industry’, says Magnezit Group CEO Sergei Odegov. ‘This is valuable raw material whose returning into the production cycle will essentially decrease the environmental load and preserve mineral wealth for future generations’.

Andrei Panshin, General Director of Chelyabinsk Zinc Plant said: ‘Why go into the mine after metal when it lies on the surface as production waste? In the whole civilized world the problem is solved exactly like that. There are enterprises in Poland, Germany for reprocessing such kinds of raw materials and we go in that direction’.

In today’s world one of the most popular and highly effective technologies of EAF dust reprocessing is by the Waelz method in rotary kilns. 80% of all dust is processed in such a way. In specialists’ opinion the Waelz process is the most progressive and environmentally safe technology. As a result of modernization and technological upgrading at the Satka Production Site enterprises of the Group the rotary kilns, put out of action, are now used for production of refractories and are basic units for the Waelz process.

Magnezit Group has capacities for processing up to 200 thousand tons of EAF dust annually. The project will allow the company to diversify production, use the capacity reserve formed in the process of complex modernizing and create up to 300 new jobs. Under the project, kilns will be partly reconstructed including installation of an up-to-date gas-cleaning plant corresponding to European standards of environmental safety in industry.

The dust collected in scrubber cells of steelmaking furnaces is stored at production sites of enterprises and the collected dust volumes are considerable. By expert estimates, Electric Arc Furnace waste of steelmaking contains from 7 to 25% of zinc, nickel and other metals oxides. With introduction of new steelmaking capacities the generated dust quantity will grow.

The high concentration of metallurgy enterprises in Ural region is the project’s advantage. Reprocessing of industrial waste will give an additional impetus to development of the resource base of the region’s enterprises. Creation of new jobs and environmental improvement will also positively influence the social stability in the South Urals and other industrial regions of Russia.