Metinvest Group’s KAMETSTAL, a steelmaking plant at Dnipro Metallurgical Plant (DMK, Kamenskoye, Dnipro Oblast), has completed a 50-day overhaul of its main air separation unit (ASU).
According to the company, on New Year’s Eve, the plant’s power engineers resumed operation of the air handling unit, and the overhaul of the AKAR-40/35 was one of the largest overhauls performed at the plant under the 2024 program.
It was specified that after completion of the scheduled repair work, specialists began preparatory pre-start-up operations in mid-December. High-temperature regeneration of the adsorbent was performed after its complete replacement. As part of the overhaul, 68 tons of zeolite and 33.6 tons of aluminum oxide, highly dispersed materials for air purification from moisture and carbon dioxide, which negatively affect the performance and quality of air distribution, were loaded into the cleaned and repaired adsorbers.
On December 26, the first post-repair oxygen was supplied to the collector after completion of the preparatory stages required by the technology – heating of the unit and cooling of the vessels and apparatus of the plant. The passport characteristics of the AKar-40/35 were restored and it started operating, after which the power engineers gradually put the AKar-30 units into reserve, which replaced the main unit during its overhaul. Tests conducted on December 28 confirmed the unit’s nameplate capacity of 40 thousand cubic meters per hour of nitrogen and 35 thousand cubic meters per hour of oxygen.
“The unit is now operating in the set mode, steadily supplying air separation products to the steelmaking process. The unit’s load varies according to the needs of the production process. Thanks to the well-established cooperation between the OCC specialists and their colleagues from the blast furnace and converter shops, we determine the optimal production mode on a daily basis without unproductive losses of oxygen produced, which makes it possible to increase the efficiency of the repaired unit and the shop as a whole,” explained Vyacheslav Grevtsev, head of the oxygen compressor shop, as quoted in the statement.
“KAMETSTAL was established on the basis of Dnipro Coke Plant and Centralized Steel Works of Dnipro Metallurgical Plant.
According to the 2020 report of Metinvest Group’s parent company, Metinvest B.V. (Netherlands) owned 100% of the shares in DCCP.
