Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636

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Powder Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/powtec

A novel blending principle and optimization model for low-carbon

and low-cost sintering in ironmaking process
Xiaoxian Huang, Xiaohui Fan ⁎, Xuling Chen ⁎, Min Gan, Zhiyun Ji, Ruyue Zheng
School of Minerals Processing & Bioengineering, Central South University, No.932, South Lushan Road, Changsha, Hunan 410083, PR China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Sintering is a raw material preparation process of blast furnace ironmaking. However, its high energy consump-
Received 26 January 2019 tion and pollutant discharge have seriously impeded the development of iron and steel enterprises. In order to
Received in revised form 27 April 2019 reduce the energy consumption and production cost while improving the sinter output and quality, a novel
Accepted 23 July 2019
blending optimization model was established based on the in-depth analysis of blending principle in this
Available online 24 July 2019
study. According to the complementary principle of the basic properties between iron ores, the blending
Keywords:
model takes the minimum blending cost as optimization objective, and searches the blending scheme group
Iron ore sintering that meets the requirements of granulation and mineralization performance. Then the yield and quality indices
Blending optimization and fuel consumption were predicted, and the optimized blending scheme that meets the user's demand is se-
Granulation performance lected via multi-index comprehensive evaluation. The experimental results show that the blending cost of opti-
Mineralization performance mized schemes reduced by 0.19–4.19% and fuel consumption decreased by 1.16–3.79 kg per ton sinter, with the
Model prediction improvement of sinter yield and quality indices. The emission of CO2 can be reduced by 15,700–51,200 tons for an
enterprise with annual output of 5 million tons of sinter.
© 2019 Published by Elsevier B.V.

1. Introduction
The crude steel production of China has exceeded 800 million tons
since 2014, which accounting for about 50% of world's production. The
convention blast furnace-converter process is mainly used in Chinese
iron and steel enterprises, in which sinter accounts for nearly 75% of
blast furnace burden [1]. Sintering is the second largest energy con-
sumption process in iron and steel making, and about 80% of energy
sources is fossil fuel [2]. The burning of fossil fuel will produce a large
amount of COx, SOx and NOx, which are the primary source of sintering
pollutants. Therefore, low-carbon sintering has become an important
issue faced by iron and steel enterprises, with the continuous improve-
ment of environmental protection requirements.
The energy consumption of sintering is closely related to the proper-
ties of raw materials. However, a variety of raw materials are used in
production plants with a range of compositions and particle sizes. Ratio-
nal and efficient use of raw materials can not only reduce the production
costs, but also lay the foundation for reducing energy consumption.
Blending ore optimizing is to set the reasonable proportion of various
raw materials by experimental research or optimization algorithm ac-
cording to the supply conditions of iron ores and the composition re-
quirements of sinter products. The early researchers were lay down
⁎ Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: huangxiaoxian@csu.edu.cn (X. Huang), csufanxiaohui@126.com
(X. Fan), csucxl1979@126.com (X. Chen).
blending scheme for sintering pot test rely on the engineers' experience
or theoretical calculation, and adjust the proportions repeatedly accord-
ing to sinter yield and quality indices [3,4]. This method is no longer
used because it needs a number of sintering pot tests and it is difficult
to obtain universal rules. With the popularization of computer technol-
ogy, linear programing, expert system and evolutionary algorithm have
been applied to blending optimization of iron ore sintering. Russell Gra-
ham et al. [5] established a linear programming model to assist the
blending process of sintering plant, to obtain lowest blending cost
under the constraints of raw materials and sinter composition. Ueno
et al. [6] developed a raw material management and control system
for sintering process, solved the large-scale integer programming prob-
lem efficiently through linear programming method. Dieter Bettinger
et al. [7,8] developed an integrated optimization system of ore prepara-
tion and sintering based on expert system, and calculated the stacking
plan for blending ore bed according to the results of raw mix calculation.
Min Wu et al. [9] developed an integrated intelligent optimization sys-
tem for sintering batching, which integrates linear programming, ge-
netic algorithm and particle swarm to optimize the ore proportion.
Focusing on the high energy consumption of sintering, Junkai Wang
et al. [10] proposed a collaborative optimization model for sintering
mixture, in which the association models between ore proportion, pro-
duction parameters and energy consumption, tumbler strength are
established firstly, and the ore proportion is optimized using energy
performance and physical index as objective functions. According to
the principle of energy balance in sintering process, Changxin Liu et al.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.powtec.2019.07.085
0032-5910/© 2019 Published by Elsevier B.V.
630 X. Huang et al. / Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of sintering process.

[11] took the energy value of sinter as optimization objective, to obtain
the optimal ore blending scheme via linear programming method. The
results show that the energy consumption and CO2 emission of optimal
blending scheme were reduced, while the cost increases. Based on the
energy flow analysis of coking, sintering and blast furnace ironmaking
process, Lingen Chen et al. [12] established an optimization model for
iron ore matching, in which energy consumption, CO2 emission and
cost minimizations are taken as optimization objectives. Chengchi He
et al. [13] established a sintering optimization model base on material
balance and exergy balance, in which the exergy loss minimization
was taken as an optimization objective to calculate the manipulated
variable such as ore proportion and fuel ratio. The suitable fuel propor-
tion of sintering process mainly depends on the raw materials
properties, such as burning loss, FeO content, high-temperature perfor-
mance. But the energy consumption evaluation in the above models are
based on production data mining or energy flow analysis, while ignor-
ing the basic properties of raw materials. It leads to deviation and lag
in optimization process of ore blending.
Sintering is a typical high-temperature reaction process. The physi-
cal and chemical properties of iron ore fines under high temperature di-
rectly affect its sintering performance. Fumio Matsuno et al. [14]
proposed the assimilation capability of iron ore firstly, to described the
reaction ability between iron ore and CaO at high temperature. Shengli
Wu et al. [15,16] put forward the new concepts of iron ore characteris-
tics, such as lowest assimilation temperature, fluidity of liquid phase,
self-strength of bonding phase, and optimized ore blending scheme on

Fig. 2. Model framework for iron ore blending optimization.

 X. Huang et al. / Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636
the basis of the relationship between iron ore characteristics and
sintering performance. Jianliang Zhang et al. [17,18] used fuzzy mem-
bership functions to predict the assimilation ability temperature and
liquid fluidity of mixed iron ore, and established a mathematical optimi-
zation model coupling chemical composition and high-temperature
characteristics of raw materials. The optimization models are not con-
ducive to the practical whenever new iron ore to be used in production,
because their inputs including the assimilation performance and fluidity
of liquid phase, which must be analyzed through special equipment.
According to the research progress of blending optimization tech-
nology, a low-carbon and low-cost blending method was proposed in
this study, and the corresponding blending optimization model was
established. Firstly, this model takes the minimum iron ore blending
cost as optimization function, and uses the optimum granulation and
mineralization performance of mixture as constraints, to search raw
materials proportion scheme. Then the solid fuel consumption, tumbler
strength and productivity of sinter of each scheme are predicted via
support vector machine. Finally, the optimized blending scheme with
better technical and economic indicators is selected through compre-
hensive evaluation method. The experimental results show that the op-
timized blending scheme can reduce production costs and energy
consumption while improve the sinter outputs and strength.
2. Blending principle and model framework
The mixture states in sintering process at different scales are shown in
Fig.1. On macroscopic scale, the mix materials are filled into the moving
pallet after mixing and granulating, and the solid fuels in mixture bed
start to burn when the pallet passing through the ignition hood. The neg-
ative pressure on the bottom side of materials bed will leading larger
amount of gas pass through it. The convection heat transfer between
gas and solid materials make the solid fuel continues to burn, and the sin-
ter finally formed after the melting and condensing of mix materials.
On particle scale, the granulated pellets first exist in the form that
the fine particles (or adhesive fines) are wrapped around coarse parti-
cles (or nuclear particles). As pellets temperature rises, the solid phase
reaction occurs between mix materials to form low-melting substance,
and the low-melting substance transform into primary liquid phase in
adhesion layer while the temperature is further increased. Under the ef-
fect of primary liquid phase, the flux in large particle size will be melted,
and the liquid phase will converge between granulated pellets with
their fluidity increases. After reaching the highest temperature, crystals
begin to precipitate, and the unfused ores is bonded to form sinter.
Fig. 3. The flow chart of optimization model solution.
631
From the multi-scale analysis, it can be seen that the granulation
performance and mineralization performance of mixture have an im-
portant influence on the yield, quality and energy consumption indices
of sinter. The better granulation performance of mixture, the better per-
meability of sintering bed, which helping to reduce the suction press
and improve the heat transfer efficiency. The better mineralization per-
formance can realize low temperature mineralization, and produce
binding phase with better strength and metallurgical properties,
which leading to reduce fuel consumption and improve sinter output
and strength at the same time.
Different iron ores have different granulation and mineralization
properties, but they can be combined into a mixture with good perfor-
mance in granulation and mineralization based on the complementarity
principle. The connotation of iron ore blending optimization is to use
this principle to improve the sintering performance of mixture, to
achieve the best productivity and tumbler strength of sinter and lowest
energy consumption. In order to search an optimum blending scheme,
an optimization model framework is designed in this research, as illus-
trated in Fig. 2.
This model is divided into three steps: optimizing of raw materials
proportion, predicting the sintering performance and evaluating the
schemes. Firstly, a group of blending schemes which satisfies the con-
straints of granulation and mineralization performance of mixture and
chemical composition of sinter, while has lower blending cost was
generated by optimization algorithm. Secondly, the basic properties
of raw materials that relates to the granulation and mineralization
performance of mixture are used as inputs, to predict the fuel con-
sumption, tumbler index and productivity. Finally, make multi-
objective decision on the blending cost, fuel consumption, tumble
strength and yield index of blending schemes, and pick out the opti-
mum blending scheme.
3. Modelling
3.1. Optimization of raw materials proportion
Set x = [x1, x2, ⋯, xn] as the proportion of raw materials, pi as price,
the objective function of blending optimization model can be described
as Eq. (1).
X
f c ðxÞ ¼ xi  p i ð1Þ
632 X. Huang et al. / Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636

The granulation performance of mixture is mainly affected by the
size distribution of raw materials. Through water sieve analysis per-
formed in our previous work [19], the granulation pellets can be divided
into nuclear particles and adhesive fines, and the particle size boundary
is 0.5 mm. Therefore, the granulation performance of mixture can be
represented by the relative content of adhesive fines, its constraint is
given by:
X
n
C min;−0:5mm ≤ xi  ci;−0:5mm ≤C max;−0:5mm
i¼1
where, ci,-0.5mm refers to the adhesive fines content of raw material i, %.
The microstructure analysis of sinter in our previous research shown
that these is part of unfused ores inside sinter [20,21], which indicated
that the fine ores are easily reacts with fluxes and fuels while the coarse
ores are incompletely participate in melting reaction. The liquid phase
regions formed by fine ores, fluxes and fuels are defined as melting
zone, in which chemical composition plays an important role on its initial
melting temperature, liquid phase content. Therefore, the mineralization
performance of mixture can be expressed in terms of compositions of
melting zone (viz. Eq. (3)), its constraint is given by Eq. (4).
P P
xi  ci;−0:5mm  ci;Q −0:5mm þ x j  c j;Q
C melt;Q ðxÞ ¼ P P  P P
xi  ci;−0:5mm þ x j 1− xi  ci;−0:5mm  ci;LOI−0:5mm − x j  c j;LOI
3.2. Prediction of sintering performance
Sintering performance refers to the process parameter like the
solid fuel consumption, and the product index such as tumbler
strength and productivity. Sintering process has the characteristics of
complex lag, it takes a long time from raw materials to finished prod-
uct. Predicting the sintering performance in the proportioning stage
can provide important information for the adjustment of blending
scheme. Therefore, the relationship between raw material properties
ð2Þ
and sintering performance was modeled by machine learning method
in this study.
Sintering performance are closely related to the granulation
and mineralization performance of mixture, where granulation
performance can be expressed by the relative content of adhesive
fines, and the mineralization performance can be characterized by
the chemical composition of melting zone (e.g. mol[CaO/ Fe2O3],
SiO 2 , Al2 O 3 , MgO). In this study, the basic properties of mixture
(including moisture, FeO and LOI content), the relative content
of adhesive fines and the chemical composition of melting zone
are taken as inputs, to predict the fuel consumption, productivity
and tumbler strength of sinter. The relationship between inputs
and outputs is
 
 f index ðxÞ ¼ f xmix;w ; xmix;FeO ; xmix;LOI ; xmix;−0:5mm ; xmelt;Ca=Fe ; xmelt;Si ; xmelt;Al ; xmelt;Mg
ð3Þ ð7Þ

where, x refers to input parameters, the subscript mix refers to

C min;melt;Q ≤Cmelt;Q ðxÞ≤C max;melt;Q ð4Þ
mixture and melt refers to melting zone.
For nonlinear functions fitting, support vector machine (SVM) is one
where, subscript i refers to the iron ores, j refers to the fluxes and fuels,
of powerful tool, and it has been applied in different domains since its
−0.5 mm refers to fines under 0.5 mm, Q is chemical composition and
strong learning and generalization ability [24]. Meanwhile, the adapt-
LOI is burning loss.
ability of SVM to small sample data is stronger than that of artificial neu-
In addition to the constraints on sintering performance, the chemical
ral network, which is suitable for the characteristics of sintering
composition of sinter must be meet the requirements of ironmaking
performance data. Least squares support vector machine (LS-SVM)
process, which can be expressed as follows:
was first proposed by Suykens and Vandewalle in 1999 for solving clas-
.X sification problem. It replaces the relaxation variable with square of
X
n n  
C min;Q ≤ ci;Q  xi 1−ci;LOI  xi ≤C max;Q ð5Þ training error, thus avoiding the complex calculation process of SVM,
i¼1 i¼1 and shortening the solving time [25].
For the given data samples {xi, yi}N i=1, where xi ∈ R
n
is a 8-
Combined with the constraints of proportion range, the optimization dimensional input vector, and yi ∈ R is the output value, N is the number
model of raw materials proportion can be expressed as follows: of training samples. After the input space is mapped to a high-
dimensional space by nonlinear function φ(xi), Eq. (7) can be expressed
8
> X n as a decision function:
>
> C min;−0:5mm ≤ xi  ci;−0:5mm ≤C max;−0:5mm
>
>
>
>
>
> i¼1 yi ¼ hw; φðxi Þi þ b ð8Þ
>
> C min;melt;Q ≤C melt;Q ðxÞ≤C max;melt;Q
<
Xn .X n  
minf c ðxÞs:t: ð6Þ where, w refers to the weight vector, b refers to deviation. Their solving
>
> C min;Q ≤ ci;Q  xi 1−ci;LOI  xi ≤C max;Q
>
> process can be transformed into an optimization problem as shown in
>
> i¼1 i¼1
>
>   Xn
>
> Eq. (9), according to the principle of structural risk minimization.
>
: xi ∈ xi; min ; xi; max ; xi ¼ 1
i¼1 8
>
< 1 Xm
2
min J ðw; ξÞ ¼ wT  w þ c ξi
2 ð9Þ
The above model is a typical constrained optimization problem. The >
: i¼1

linear programming is very mature algorithm for solving this kind of s:t: yi ¼ wT  φðxi Þ þ b þ ξi ; i ¼ 1; 2; ⋯m
problem, and there are many examples of its application [22]. But this
method requires linear constraints, it cannot deal with the constraints The Lagrangian function established by the objective function and
of mineralization performance. Genetic algorithm is a random search constraints is
technology, which has been widely studied and applied because of its
strong global search ability [23]. However, due to the large number of 1 T 1 Xm
2
Xm  
Lðw; b; ξ; α Þ ¼ w wþ c ξ − α i wT  φðxi Þ þ b þ ξi −yi ð10Þ
arguments and constraints involved in this problem, the solution effi- 2 2 i¼1 i i¼1
ciency of Genetic algorithm is very low while the initial solution is ran-
domly generated. An initial blending scheme that meet the constraints Based on the optimum condition, the partial derivatives of L for w
of granulation performance and sinter compositions (viz. Eqs. (2) and and b are zero, that,
(5)) is firstly calculated by linear programming, and it is used as an ini-
X
m X
m  
tial individual to accelerate the genetic evolution. Fig. 3 outlines the so- w− α i φðxi Þ ¼ 0; α i ¼ 0; α i ¼ cξi ; wT  φðxi Þ þ b þ ξi −yi ¼ 0 ð11Þ
lution process of the optimization model of raw materials proportion. i¼1 i¼1
 X. Huang et al. / Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636 633

Fig. 4. Predicted values versus actual values of fuel consumption. Fig. 6. Predicted values versus actual values of productivity.

By introducing the kernel function K(xi, xj) = φ(xi)T ⋅ φ(xj), the above where, Z is comprehensive evaluation index, w refers to weight, ∑w =
equation can be transformed into: 1. The subscripts bc, sfc, pi, ti refers to the blending cost, solid fuel con-
     sumption, productivity and tumble index respectively. The subscripts
T
0  Y
 b 0 min and max respectively represent the minimum and maximum
¼ ð12Þ
Y K xi ; x j þ 1=c  I α y values of an indicator. The weight factors of each indices are set accord-
ing to the requirements of user, the higher comprehensive evaluation
where, Y is a unit matrix of m × m. And the decision function can be index means the higher technical and economic value of the blending
expressed as: scheme.
X
m
f index ðxi Þ ¼ α i K ðx; xi Þ þ b ð13Þ 4. Results and discussion
i¼1

4.1. Prediction results

3.3. Comprehensive evaluation
The optimization model of raw materials proportion will give a
number of blending schemes, which needs to be evaluated from the as-
pects of blending cost, solid fuel consumption, productivity and tumbler
strength, so as to optimize the suitable blending scheme. In this study, a
comprehensive index method was used to evaluate the blending
In this research, 80 sets of sintering experiments data were collected
to train model, 50 groups of them were randomly selected as training
samples, and the remaining 30 groups were used as testing set. The
Table 1
Setting of constraints range.

schemes, given as: Constraint Item Min Max

ybc; min ysfc; min ypi;i yti;i Granulation performance Content of adhesive fines (%) 40 50
Z i ¼ wbc þ wsfc þ wpi þ wti ð14Þ Mineralization performance mol[CaO/Fe2O3] 0.6 0.8
xbc;i ysfc;i ypi; max yti; max SiO2 (%) 5 5.5
MgO (%) 0 6
Al2O3 (%) 0 2.5
Sinter compositions TFe (%) 55 58
R[CaO/SiO2] 1.9 2.1
SiO2 (%) 4.6 5.2
MgO (%) 1.8 2.2

Table 2
Iron ores blending schemes.

Iron ore Percentages (%)

Base Opti01 Opti02 Opti03 Opti04

FIO01 39.71 26.20 5.00 0 18.53

FIO02 11.66 18.40 26.60 35.06 9.37
FIO03 0 24.17 0 0 26.22
FIO04 12.69 5.00 20.90 18.70 5.67
FIO05 0 0 10.11 14.35 0
FIO06 24.95 18.00 18 15.56 18.00
DIO01 10.98 0 0 0 0
DIO02 0 0 0 6.52 8.87
DIO03 0 2.41 10.00 0 0
DIO04 0 5.82 9.39 9.81 13.34
Fig. 5. Predicted values versus actual values of tumbler index.
634 X. Huang et al. / Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636

Table 3 Table 5
Adhesive fines content and melting zone composition of mixture. Sintering pot test results.

Schemes f-0.5mm (%) Chemical composition in melting zone Schemes VSS (mm/min) Y (%) TI (%) PI (t/m2/h) SFC (kg/t)

mol[CaO/Fe2O3] SiO2 (%) MgO (%) Al2O3 (%) Base 23.16 73.20 67.20 1.40 61.36
Opti01 23.78 78.41 67.88 1.59 60.20
Base 52.69 0.61 5.34 3.58 2.05
Opti02 24.00 78.44 66.91 1.51 57.57
Opti01 43.37 0.74 5.10 4.08 2.37
Opti03 24.79 76.38 68.69 1.63 58.81
Opti02 43.15 0.88 5.34 3.94 2.02
Opti04 25.14 72.04 68.15 1.45 59.02
Opti03 39.25 0.96 5.47 4.23 2.08
Opti04 47.71 0.73 5.48 3.69 2.39

scheme in terms of technical and economic indicators, and can

model was trained by LS-SVM in the form of RBF kernel function, and it
has two important parameters γ and σ2. Where γ is a penalty coefficient
used to control the fitting error, and σ2 is the bandwidth of RBF, the
fitting error decreases with its decreasing, but the training time will
be prolonged. These two parameters were optimized by the combina-
tion of grid search and cross-validation.
Figs. 4, 5 and 6 depict the predicted results for solid fuel consump-
tion, tumbler index and productivity in testing set. The predicted values
of these three sintering indicators are consistent with the experimental
values. Taking ±1 kg/t, ±1% and ± 0.08 t/m2/h as criterion, the predic-
tion accuracy of solid fuel consumption, tumbler index and productivity
is 90%, 93% and 93% respectively. In summary, the prediction model
built by LS-SVM has good generalization ability, the prediction accuracy
is over 90%.
4.2. Blending optimization results
Take the raw material conditions (see Appendices) of sintering
process in large-scale steel mill as an example, the optimization
model was run under the constraints in Table 1, where the constraint
ranges of granulation and mineralization performance are set mainly
depended on our previous researches [19,21], and the min and max
of sinter compositions are set according to the requirements of
ironmaking process. The optimum results of blending schemes are
listed in Table 2.
Table 3 lists the calculation results of the adhesive fines content and
the melting zone composition of mixture. The adhesive fines content of
base scheme is too high, it will lead to the decrease of the permeability
of sintering bed due to the fines particles cannot adhere to granules. Op-
timized blending schemes reduces the proportion of iron ores with high
content of adhesive fine, such as FIO06 and DIO01, to reduces the adhe-
sive fines content of mixture. In addition, the mol[CaO/Fe2O3] of base
scheme is too low, it is not conducive to the formation of liquid phase
due to the decreasing of low melting point substances formed in the
solid phase reaction process. The mol[CaO/Fe2O3] of mixture of opti-
mum blending schemes are improved owning to the proportion of
iron ores with higher mol[CaO/Fe2O3] are increased, such as FIO02,
DIO04 and so on.
The blending cost, predicted results of sintering performance (in-
cludes solid fuel consumption, productivity, tumbler index) and com-
prehensive evaluation index (CEI) are shown in Table 4. The blending
cost of optimum schemes is declined, and the tumbler index and pro-
ductivity of sinter is improved while solid fuel consumption is re-
duced. The optimized blending schemes is superior to the base
Table 4
Predicted results of sintering indicators and comprehensive evaluation index.
Schemes BC TI (%) PI (t/m2/h) SFC (kg/t)
achieve low-carbo and low-cost sintering. The weight factors of blend-
ing cost, solid fuel consumption, productivity and tumble index are set
to 0.3, 0.2, 0.2 and 0.3, respectively. The CEI of both optimized
schemes are higher than that of base scheme, and the Opti03 scheme
has the best CEI.
Sintering pot test were carried out for both base scheme and opti-
mum scheme, experimental results listed in Table 5. The vertical
sintering speed of optimum schemes were accelerated compared
with that of base scheme, which indicates that the permeability of
sintering beds was improved since the granulation performance of
mixtures were optimized. Experiment results show that the actual
value of tumbler index and productivity are close to the predictive
value (in Table 4), and the deviation of these two indices are less
than ±1% and ± 0.08 t/m2/h respectively. The increasing of sinter
yield, productivity and tumbler strength can be regarded as the joint
effect of the optimization of granulation and mineralization perfor-
mance. The solid fuel consumption of optimized scheme is 1.16–
3.79 kg/t lower than that of the base scheme. If the carbon emission
factor of coke breeze is 2.7 kgCO2/kg, the emission of CO2 will be de-
creased by 15,700–51,200 tons for an enterprise with annual output of
5 million tons of sinter.
5. Conclusions
In order to improve the green manufacturing of iron ore sintering, a
low-carbon and low-cost iron ore blending method is proposed and the
corresponding optimization model is established in this paper. The
main conclusions can be summarized as follows:
(1) A novel blending method is proposed based on the complemen-
tarity principle of granulation and mineralization performance of
iron ores, which is represented by the relative content of adhe-
sive fines and the chemical compositions of melting zone.
(2) The optimization model minimizes blending cost in the con-
straints of the optimum granulation and mineralization perfor-
mance of mixture. The fuel consumption, tumbler strength and
productivity of sinter is predicted using the basic properties of
raw materials, and comprehensive evaluation index is calculated
on the basic of predicted values. This integrate model optimizes
the raw material cost with the consideration of sintering perfor-
mance, it is an important tool to realize low-carbon and low-cost
sintering.
(3) The experimental results show that the optimum blending
schemes improve the output and strength of sinter while reduc-
ing the blending cost by 0.19–4.19% and decreasing the fuel con-
sumption by 1.16 kg/t-sinter. The emission of CO2 will be
decreased by 15,700–51,200 tons for an enterprise with annual
output of 5 million tons of sinter.
CEI

Base 100 66.94 1.46 60.89 0.959 Acknowledgement

Opti01 98.62 67.35 1.52 59.06 0.978
Opti02 98.32 67.58 1.56 58.62 0.987 This work was financially supported by the National Natural
Opti03 96.81 67.93 1.59 59.43 0.994 Science Foundation of China (Grant No. U1660206, No.U1760107 and
Opti04 99.81 68.69 1.50 58.75 0.979
No.51804347).
 X. Huang et al. / Powder Technology 355 (2019) 629–636 635

Appendix A. Appendices
The physicochemical properties of iron ores, the chemical composition of adhesive fines and other materials used in optimization model are listed in
Tables A.1–A.3.

Table A.1
Physicochemical properties of iron ores.

Iron ore Chemical composition (%) f-0.5mm (%)

TFe FeO SiO2 CaO MgO Al2O3 LOI

FIO01 61.87 0.14 3.50 0.035 0.064 2.50 6.30 39.23

FIO02 56.58 0.10 6.05 0.089 0.097 2.63 8.31 12.04
FIO03 61.87 0.27 4.32 0.035 0.054 2.75 2.78 28.78
FIO04 64.93 1.25 3.09 0.01 0.033 1.08 3.07 56.38
FIO05 61.76 0.08 6.28 0.045 0.024 2.04 0.73 9.60
FIO06 65.90 1.56 4.91 0.007 0.11 0.77 0.13 90.5
DIO01 56.17 11.02 8.35 1.75 0.61 2.67 3.09 54.37
DIO02 52.23 3.57 9.50 2.42 0.96 2.83 6.71 25.88
DIO03 50.02 5.06 12.09 2.34 0.81 3.94 4.27 19.11
DIO04 61.80 24.61 6.09 1.42 0.83 1.73 1.77 74.83

Table A.2
Chemical composition of adhesive fines (iron ores under 0.5 mm).

Iron ore Chemical composition (%)

TFe FeO SiO2 CaO MgO Al2O3 LOI

FIO01 60.93 0.45 3.66 0.01 0.12 3.10 5.75

FIO02 57.46 0.10 5.15 0.24 0.13 3.24 8.17
FIO03 60.78 0.45 5.50 0.12 0.093 3.12 4.01
FIO04 62.50 1.19 4.05 0.072 0.12 1.20 3.55
FIO05 58.05 0.27 11.11 0.082 0.065 3.04 1.26
FIO06 65.90 1.56 4.91 0.007 0.11 0.77 0.13
DIO01 52.95 24.36 11.61 3.15 1.00 2.18 5.99
DIO02 52.45 5.08 10.78 1.20 0.67 3.17 6.75
DIO03 52.55 4.81 11.22 1.16 0.58 3.40 5.00
DIO04 60.42 20.13 6.72 1.05 0.76 3.01 2.80

Table A.3
Chemical composition of other materials.

Other materials Chemical composition (%)

TFe SiO2 CaO MgO Al2O3 LOI

Dolomite 0.59 2.13 30.65 19.54 0.52 44.05

Limestone 0.28 1.32 52.81 0.64 0.30 41.23
Coke 1.00 5.46 0.60 0.11 4.28 87.99
Quick lime 0.054 0.31 75.48 10.39 0.42 11.19
Return fines 52.44 6.27 10.77 2.70 2.17 0.73

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