[Gasification] Steel making Charcoal

Mark Elliott Ludlow mark at ludlow.com
Sat Aug 16 01:43:35 CDT 2014


Are these TLUD arrangements only good for batch production? According to
most descriptions, the fundamental operational principal is violated when
one 'piles on' an existing burn. Am I seeing this correctly? Should we feed
biomass such as twigs and leaves from below (thus destroying the elegant
simplicity)?

Curious,
Mark

-----Original Message-----
From: Gasification [mailto:gasification-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On
Behalf Of Anand Karve
Sent: Friday, August 15, 2014 8:29 PM
To: Discussion of biomass pyrolysis and gasification
Cc: Priyadarshini Karve
Subject: Re: [Gasification] Steel making Charcoal

Dear List Members,
this has been a very interesting and informative discussion. We have
developed a TLUD charring kiln for agri-waste, leaf litter from forests and
avenues, and urban cumbustible garbage. It produces powdery charcoal which
burns absolutely without smoke (i.e. no volatiles). I was wondering, if it
can be used in the steel industry.
Yours
A.D.Karve

On Fri, Aug 15, 2014 at 6:40 PM, Thomas Reed <tombreed2010 at gmail.com> wrote:
> All:
>
> I'm not sure whether we have connected TLUD charcoal with the rest of this
discussion.
>
> If you make a pile of dry wood and light it ON TOP it will make charcoal
quite efficiently (20%?), because the first layer on top starts burning the
cellulose in the second layer and the combustible gases (CO, H2, CH4) from
the cellulose PROTECT the first layer charcoal.
>
> If you do this in a closed container, you can run a generator from the
Cell-Gas and have electric power as a by-product of the charcoal making.
>
> Conventional charcoal making  at typically 400C leaves a LOT of volatiles
in the charcoal.  The TLUD charcoal reaches temperatures of 500-800C,
depending on air thruput, natural or forced draft.  So you can control the
quality of the TLUD charcoal if you make it in a tin can, garbage can or
retort.
>
> A Win, Win, win situation.
>
> Tom
>
> Thomas B Reed
> 280 Hardwick Rd
> Barre, Ma 01005
> 508-353-7841
>
>> On Aug 15, 2014, at 7:57 AM, Peter Davies <idgasifier at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Geoff,
>>
>> We had the privilege of being closely involved in a steel industry study
and pilot trial addressing these questions a few years ago, we provided the
protocols and plantation sourced raw wood for charcoal production in
existing coke ovens and ultimately supplies of charcoal from a range of
species through our own retorts. These charcoal samples were then used in a
test blast furnace owned by BHP/Bluescope Steel which modeled exactly the
behavior of the production ones in use.
>>
>> The results were outstanding. Renewable carbon from these sources
substantially outperformed fossil sources in both quality of end product and
efficiency of production, I believe the figure was close to a 40% production
enhancement due to the higher reactivity of the wood charcoal. The key
though is in obtaining sustainable sources in the volumes required. I recall
a figure of 1 million tonnes of wood charcoal for the local steel producers
which were themselves <1% of the global industry.
>>
>> It can be done under the right circumstances, much more so for steel
recycling operations, and there are many smaller steel producers who could
benefit where good local biomass resources exist and are well managed. The
char though has to be >80% fixed carbon. We have found our gasifiers ideal
for char of the this quality, both in what they produce directly and in the
ability to cleanly operate integrated high temperature char retorts.
>>
>> Peter
>>
>>
>>
>>> On 15/08/2014 3:01 PM, Geoff Thomas wrote:
>>> ,
>>>> On 15/08/2014, at 4:00 AM,
gasification-request at lists.bioenergylists.org wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Today's Topics:
>>> Hi People, i had a question the other day about Coal being the only way
to make Steel, from my friend GeoffH,  i am putting the question below, it
is in two parts, and my answer below that, - displaying my ignorance, -
particularly if gasified waste would reach the high temperature required, -
I realise Charcoal does, and also the aluminium reaction I mentioned, but am
personally skating on very thin ice re temperature.
>>>
>>> Please comment, I believe it is an important area of discussion in 
>>> the gasification arena, - PS,  I have a thick skin :)
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Geoff Thomas.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> "Had a discussion with someone about the concept of 100% renewables as
to whether renewable could substitute for coal in steelmaking.
>>>  Well, it seems coal is important not only for generating very high
temperatures, but also for the chemical use of carbon monoxide in extracting
the iron from iron ore.
>>>  There are alternatives - maybe - such a DRI and 'sponge iron'.
Hydrogen can be used instead of carbon monoxide but is so much more
expensive.
>>>  The Comments listed at the end of this article (on the Net) are
insightful.
>>>  Interested in other people's comments on steel production vis-à-vis
renewable energy.
>>>  Cheers,
>>> GeoffH
>>>      
>>> http://theenergycollective.com/robertwilson190/308896/explosive-grow
>>> th-steel-production-china-why-it-matters
>>> The Explosive Growth of Steel Production in China: Why It Matters 
>>> Posted November 27, 2013
>>> Keywords: Carbon and De-carbonization, Energy Security, Tech, 
>>> Sustainability, Coal, Environmental Policy, China, Energy, Energy 
>>> and Economy, Energy Collective Exclusive, Fuels, china, industry growth,
steel, The Energy Transition  China and Steel Growth There is no material
more fundamental to industrial civilization than steel. Modern buildings,
ships, cars, planes and bridges would all be unthinkable without steel, and
as pointed out by Allwood and Cullen in their fine recent book on materials
production we currently have no viable substitute materials that could
perform steel's multiple functions. We are still very much living in the
iron age.
>>> Global production of steel has now reached almost 1.5 billion tonnes
each year. The geographic make up of steel production however has changed
profoundly in the last decade. In the year 2000 China produced 15% of the
world's steel. Today almost half of the world's steel is made in China, with
Chinese steel production increasing by over 500% since 2000. The astonishing
levels of steel consumption in China is illustrated by the fact that 60% of
rebar, used in buildings to reinforce concrete, that is produced each year
is now consumed in China.
>>>  Energy requirements of steel manufacturing in China Last year China 
>>> produced 708 million tonnes of steel. On average each tonne of steel
produced in China requires the equivalent of 0.69 tonnes of coal in energy
consumption. In other words China's steel industry consumes the equivalent
of 500 million tonnes of coal each year, and this being China more or less
all of the energy used to make steel comes from coal. China's steel industry
consumes almost 7% of the world's coal, and if China's steel industry was a
country it would rank 6th globally in total primary energy consumption,
ranking above both Germany and Canada. A comparison of this level of energy
consumption with current global consumption of wind and solar energy is
sobering.
>>>  As with all comparisons of energy consumption, methods and calculations
should be laid out transparently. Here I will compare the total primary
energy consumption of China's steel industry with global primary energy
consumption of wind and solar. In 2012 wind and solar electricity production
was 614 TWh (trillion watt hours). However to make a more apples to apples
comparison we should ask how much coal would be needed to produce this
electricity. Using this approach current annual global energy consumption
from wind and solar works out as 200 million tonnes of coal equivalent
(using EIA's conversion methodology and BP's assumptions for the average
thermal efficiency of power plants).  Therefore growth in global energy
consumption from wind and solar since 2000 has been approximately half of
the increase in energy consumption by China's steel sector alone. A stark
illustration of how little has been achieved in the transition to low carbon
energy.
>>>  This rapid growth in Chinese steel consumption poses another problem.
We are not only fundamentally dependent on steel production, but as Vaclav
Smil points out steel production is more or less fundamentally dependent on
the large scale use of coal, with no prospect of a transition to low carbon
methods of steel production in the short to medium term. Calls to fully
dismantle the coal industry must consider how we can make steel without
coal, because currently no methods seem particularly feasible. Globally
about 1 billion tonnes of coal is used to produce steel, representing 14% of
total coal production, with steel and iron production equating to over 6% of
global carbon dioxide emissions. This figure is much higher than that of the
aviation industry, yet have you ever read an op-ed calling steel
manufacturing a rogue industry?
>>>  The vast disparities in steel consumption in the world today suggest
that a significant increase in overall steel consumption is inevitable and
probably desirable. We are however reaching the limits of how efficiently
steel can be produced, and despite multiple opportunities to improve the
rationality of steel use it appears clear that we will need to mine hundreds
of millions of tonnes of coal each year to produce steel for decades, and
more likely, generations to come. These realities should be borne in mind by
those who claim there are no significant barriers to 100% renewable energy."
>>>
>>> Hi GeoffH, thing with steel making is to remove the oxygen from the Iron
Ore, ( basically iron oxide) which is done by the carbon in the charcoal
(coal,) but charcoal is not the only way (the Japanese have been using wood
charcoal to make steel from 6000BC) nor is coal the best source of charcoal,
so this is a fruit-full area of possible development.
>>> Interestingly, there was a development called Direct Reduced Iron 
>>> some 20 odd years ago where electricity was used on an iron/carbon
briquette, (my vague remembering) and of course in this time we can talk of
electricity from Solar, Wind, Geothermal or tidal/wave to provide at times
when any of those have too much, but on another side, my grandfather who was
a railwayman in between fishing, when they mixed aluminium powder with rust,
to weld the rails together, - the yearning of the aluminium for oxygen
(which is normally halted by it's instant oxide coating) would cause it to
burn in that reduced environment, created by the railway workers with clay
moulds from local mud, so the aluminium would effectively disappear,
(evaporate or float to the top) leaving superheated steel which would go
down into the clay mould between the two rail ends - so hot it would melt
the steel rails on either side to join them, The point being that not only
carbon will do that chemical transformation with steel.
>>>  For changing the steel production away from coal we could consider
using gasification, where one has a carbon containing substance, - such as
waste from cities, burns it without enough oxygen so creates Carbon
Monoxide, very hot, so also gives your reaction that energy,  - and of
course the carbon monoxide, hungry for more oxygen so that it can become
carbon dioxide, takes that oxygen away from the iron oxide, simply put.
>>>  Whether we blow that carbon dioxide through an 'algal bloom bed' to 
>>> make more biomass or vent it to the atmosphere may well be a point 
>>> but my main point is that the coal can stay in the ground, where it 
>>> was laid down in the Pleistocene,
>>>
>>> So we have, from gasification, carbon monoxide, produced from waste, to
make steel.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Geoff Thomas.
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> .
>>
>> --
>> Peter Davies
>> Director
>> ID Gasifiers Pty Ltd
>> Delegate River, Victoria
>> Australia
>> Ph: 0402 845 295
>>
>>
>>
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--
***
Dr. A.D. Karve
Trustee & Founder President, Appropriate Rural Technology Institute (ARTI)

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