Melting behavior of hot briquetted iron (HBI) and

dephosphorization efficiency in EAF process condition

Minjoo Lee1, Joo Hyun Park1,*

1Department of Materials Science and Chemical Engineering, Hanyang University,

Ansan, Korea

* Corresponding author: basicity@hanyang.ac.kr

The effect of gangue oxides and carbon in hot briquetted iron(HBI) on

dephosphorization efficiency and melting behavior were invenstigated in an
induction furnace with MgO curcible. From 600oC to melting point of iron during
heating, CO and CO2 gases were generated by the reaction between FeO and solid
carbon in HBI. At the melting point, the partially melted Fe, CO gas evolution and
floated slag were observed during initial melting stage. Thereafter, the acidic slag by
the melting of gangue oxide in HBI covered the surface of molten iron. After melting
reaction, a vigorous slag foaming occurred when carbon content was greater than
about 0.1 wt%. Also, the dephosphorization efficiency was calculated using
FactSage software. From the results, slags produced by gangue oxides, which
mainly contains high amount of SiO2, have no influence on dephosphorization
reaction. So, for the industrial process, slag composition should be carefully
designed using additional basic flux to increase the dephosphorization efficiency.

Key Words HBI, Gangue oxide, Melting, Gas evolution, Slag foaming,
Dephosphorization

1. Introduction

In order to reduce CO2 emissions, steel companies are trying to develop the EAF
steelmaking process instead of BF(–BOF) route. EAF process reduces about 80%
of CO2 emissions than BF(–BOF) process. But, in original scrap based EAF process,
the high quality steel manufacturing is hardly achievable because of the tramp
elements such as copper in scrap. To solve this problem, DRI(or HBI) are widely
used as a substitute for virgin scrap in EAF. Unfortunately, however, commercially
available DRI contains a relatively high level of phosphorus, which adversely affects
the properties of steels. Thus, dephosphorization method using basic slags in the
EAF process have been studied[1-3]. Heo and Park [1] confirmed the effect of DRI
addition on phosphorus removal efficiency by EAF slag. The higher addition of DRI
made dephosphorization more difficult by decreasing the slag basicity (CaO/SiO2
ratio) and the stability of P2O5 in the slag. Oh et al. [3] reported the effect of CaF2 on
phosphorus refining efficiency. The phosphorus distribution ratio decreased from 30
to 15 by adding 20% HBI. However, when approx. 5 wt% CaF2 was add in the slag,
the phosphorus distribution ratio recovered 30 because of an increase in the
thermodynamic stabilization of phosphate ion. Unfortunately, however, the melting
and dephosphorization behavior in EAF process conditions employing the 100% HBI
have not been fully investigated. Hence, we observed the morphology and
distribution of elements with gangue oxides in HBI from different suppliers and
investigated the melting phenomena during heating the HBI as an alternative iron
source.

2. Experimental procedure

Before melting, as-received HBI samples were cut into small pieces and polished to
characterize the gangue oxides and carbon distributions in HBI. A high-frequency
induction furnace was used to observe the melting behavior and the slag-metal
reactions. 400g HBI was charged in a fused magnesia crucible. To decrease the
analytical errors in chemical compositions, sulfur (FeS) and phosphorus (Fe3P) were
added to adjust the initial content of 0.05%S and 0.1%P. The chemical compositions
of different HBI are listed in Table I.

Table I. Chemical compositions of as-received HBI in this study (wt%).

HBI Fe.Total Fe.Metal C S P SiO2 Al2O3 MnO MgO CaO
A 91.0 85.0 1.3 0.005 0.07 1.2 0.4 0.2 0.6 1.3
B 90.0 83.0 1.0 0.020 0.02 3.4 0.7 0.1 0.2 0.9
C 90.0 83.5 1.4 0.010 0.04 1.2 0.4 0.1 0.4 0.9
D 91.1 87.6 2.1 0.003 0.02 2.3 0.2 0.2 0.3 1.3

The experimental temperature was increased by 10oC/min rate and hold at 1550oC.
When the temperature was reached at 1550oC, metal samples were taken at 0, 5,
10, 20 minutes by a vacuum suction method. After 20 minutes, 20g synthetic flux
(CaO-SiO2, C/S=1) was added to the surface of the molten iron in an inert Ar-3H2
gas atmosphere. After addition of synthetic flux, metal samples were taken at 5, 10,
15, 30, 60 minutes. Slag samples were taken at 5, 10, 60 minutes, followed by
quenching in water. The metal compositions were determined by ICP-OES. Carbon
and sulfur contents in the metal samples were determined using a combustion
analyzer. The compositions of molten iron after HBI melting are listed in Table II.

Table II. Chemical compositions of melted HBI at 1550oC (wt%).

HBI Si Al Mn P C S
A <0.01 < 0.01 < 0.01 0.07 0.02 0.09
B <0.01 < 0.01 < 0.01 0.09 0.15 0.04
C <0.01 < 0.01 < 0.01 0.06 0.01 0.05
D <0.10 < 0.01 < 0.10 0.11 0.93 0.05

3. Results and discussion

3.1 Gas evolution during heating HBI

It is important to understand the melting behavior when gangue oxides and carbon
are presented in HBI. The CO and CO2 gases evolution and temperature profile as
function of heating time are shown in Fig. 1. Two steps of gas evolution tendency
are occurred in all samples. First, from 600oC to melting point, CO and CO2 gases
are generated by Eqs. [1] to [3].
 FeO(s) + C(s) = () + () [1]
FeO(s) + CO(g) = () +  () [2]
Ca (s) = CaO(s) +  (g) [3]

Over the 1000oC, the tendency of CO gas evolution decreases due to an elimination
of carbon near FeO by the reduction reaction. At the melting point, partially melted
Fe, CO gas evolution and floated slag were observed during initial melting. Thus, the
reduction reaction of FeO in molten slag takes place as follows.

(FeO) + [C] = () + () [4]

Thereafter, the slag which was formed by melting of gangue oxides in HBI covered
the molten steel as shown in Fig. 2. A vigorous slag foaming was induced by
reduction reaction between FeO and carbon in the HBI samples B and D, but there
were few CO bubbles in the HBI samples A and C.

Figure 1. Evolution of gases (CO and CO2) as function of the initial HBI type.

Figure 2. Snapshot of slag surface after DRI melting at 1550oC

Because carbon was almost consumed during melting the A and C samples (Table
II), there was less carbon to produce CO bubbles. So, it was found that carbon
content over 0.1 wt% in molten iron can produce an active slag foaming by
continuous reaction between FeO and carbon in the melt.

3.2 Dephosphorization efficiency

Dephosphorization efficiency (called  ) is defined by Eq. [5], and is affected by
the distribution ratio of phosphorus between metal and slag, which is expressed in
Eq. [6].

([ % ]°[ % ])

 (%) = [ % ]°
∗ 100 [5]

( %   )
 = [6]
[ % ]

However, in this study, because the amount of slag is too small to anlayze the slag
composition,  was calculated using FactSage software. From the simple mass
balance of phosphorus between slag and metal phases,the equilibrium phosphorus
coneten in molten iron can be deduced from the weight of slag and metal as shown
in Eq. [7];[4]

 ∙[ %]°
[% ] = [7]
  ∙

where  ,  , and [%]° are the weight of metal and slag, and initial content
of phosphorus in liquid iron. The  and   in each sample and the basic
calculation conditions are listed in Table III.
Table III. Calculation results for phosphorus equilibrium using FactSage.
HBI LP [wt%P] De-P Initial condition
A 0.3 0.099 1.4% [wt%P]o = 0.1
B 0.03 0.0998 0.2%  = 100 ton
C 0.2 0.099 1.1%  = 5 ton
D 0.001 0.09997 0.03%

From the results shown in Table III, slags producted by gangue oxides, which mainly
contains high amount of SiO2, have no influence on dephosphorization reaction. So,
for the industrial process, slag composition should be carefully designed using
additional basic flux to increase the dephosphorization efficiency.

REFERENCES

[1] Heo, J.H. and Park, J.H.: Metall. Matter. Trans. B, 49 (2018), 3381.
[2] Heo, J.H. and Park, J.H.: Metall. Matter. Trans. B, 52 (2021), 3613.
[3] Oh, M.K., Kim, T.S. and Park, J.H.: Metall. Matter. Trans. B, 51 (2020), 3028.
[4] Park, G.H., Kang, Y.B. and Park, J.H.: ISIJ Int., 51 (2011), 1375.