Part A

Marks: 35=15

1. Draw a sketch of a blast furnace and identify different mechanical zones in the blast
furnace. Draw the thermal profile along the height from the tuyere level to the top.
Mark thermal reserve zone and chemical reserve zone. Write different chemical
reaction in the different zone according to the thermal profile.

Ans:
2. A blast furnace uses magnetite ore (ignore presence of gangue material) and is
operated with coke with 82 wt% C. Calculate the coke rate required per tonne of hot
metal production.

Given:
Hot metal contains 4.3 wt% C (ignore other metalloids)
Blast rate is 1402.13 Nm3
Top gas contains 23 % CO, 18 % CO2 and rest is N2.

Ans:

Hot metal contains 4.3 wt% C. So, Fe is 95.7 wt %.

Therefore, 1 tonne hot metal contains 957 kg of Fe and 43 kg of C.

Let us say, x kg mole of coke is required for production of 1 tonne of hot metal
assuming 100 % utilization of coke.

Now,

957 kg of Fe = 957/56 = 17.089 kg-mol.

43 kg of C = 43/12 = 3.583 kg-mol

 m
C

Fe
Content of C (in kg-mol) per kg-mol of Fe in hot metal, =
3.583/17.089 =0.2097
nOB
x
O

Fe
Let, number of mole of oxygen (O) in the blast is .

Let, O (in kg-mol) per kg-mol of Fe in ore is = 1.33

g
O 0.18
1 X CO
g
1 1.44
C 2
0.23 0.18
Let, O (in kg-ml) per kg-mol of C is

Hot blast contains 21 % O2 and rest N2.

Oxygen in the blast = 0.211402.13 Nm3 = 294.4473 Nm3

= (294.4473/22.4)
= 13.145 kg-mol.

As we are doing mass balance in O not in O2, the amount of O will be 213.145 kg-mol
= 26.29 kg-mol.
Iron (Fe) balance:
i
n Fe n Fe
O

(1)

Oxygen (O) balance:

x g
O O
i
n
Fe n
B
O nCg
Fe C
(2)
Carbon balance:

m
C
g 0.82 x n g
n FeO
n
C
C
Fe
(3)
After getting from equation (2) and putting it in equation (3), we get,

X = 45.88 kg-mol = 550.59 kg.

3. A blast furnace is running at 2700 Nm3/m2.h and the top and bottom pressure are 1.1
ata and 2.6 ata respectively. Calculate the top and bottom pressure required to operate
the furnace at 3000 Nm3/m2.h blast rate keeping the linear gas velocity and the
pressure drop the same. Given n = 1.8.

Ans:
Let us consider,
Case 1:
Pt1 1.1 PB1 2.6
V1 = 2700
Nm3/hr.m2

Case 2:
Pt2 ? PB2 ?
V2 = 3000
Nm3/hr.m2

We know that,

pb2 pt2 k ' v n

Now from the problem statement,

p B2 pt2 pB1 pt1 2.6 1.1 1.5 ata

(1)
And, n = 1.8

Taking the ratio of case 2 and case 1 we get,

 p 2B2 p 2t2
k ' v 21.8
' 1.8
p B1 p t1 k v1
2 2

1. 8
10
PB2 Pt2 3.7 4.47
9

Or, (2)
PB2 Pt2
From equation (1) and (2), = 2.986 ata and =1.484 ata