Production of hot metal from the Hlsmelt Research and Development
Facility at Kwinana, Western Australia commenced in October 1993. The
stand-alone facility is a unique, coal-based, integrated ironworks
equipped to process iron ore fines to pig iron and simultaneously
undertake a wide range of research tasks. The data generated will be used
to verify the commercial potential of the technology and to set the design
and operating parameters for a full-scale production plant. The design,
construction, commissioning and initial operation of the HRDF has
required many innovative and practical solutions to be developed and
implemented by the international group of organisations contributing to
the Hlsmelt Project. Initial operation has produced results which demonstrate the potential
of the unique process technology associated with the core plant smelting
unit. The recent achievement of post-combustion levels of 60 per cent
with heat transfer efficiencies greater than 85 per cent demonstrates that
the performance obtained with the Small Scale Pilot Plant in Maxhutte,
Germany can be reproduced at a larger scale. The results presented in this
paper support the thrust for further intensification and future
commercialisation of the process.