Northern Mining and Processing Plant (Pivdennyi GOK, Kryvyi Rih, Dnipro region), part of Metinvest Group, has upgraded its pellet production to improve its quality by increasing the share of iron in the product.
According to the company’s information on Monday, a modernization project was implemented at the pellet production shop No. 2 of Northern GOK using the LURGI 552V roasting machine.
It is specified that thanks to the introduction of the innovation, the specialists managed to establish the production of homogeneous pellets with an iron content of 65% or more. This opened up prospects for the company to maintain a competitive position in the European iron ore market.
The press service notes that before the outbreak of the full-scale war, Yenakiieve Iron Ore Enrichment was largely focused on supplying iron ore to Metinvest Group’s Ukrainian steelmaking companies. However, with the temporary loss of control over its Mariupol plants and the blockade of the Black Sea ports, the plant was forced to look for alternative markets for its commercial products. European steel mills were a promising prospect. Northern GOK’s technologists applied operational improvements in the concentrate and pellet production chain to ensure that Northern GOK’s iron ore meets the requirements of European steelmakers.
To improve the quality of products, the LURGI 552V roasting machine underwent a large-scale overhaul to modernize the raw pellet screen. The special design of the equipment made it impossible for products larger than the standard to enter the roasting machine. As a result, the output quality of unfluxed pellets has improved.
Made from premium A1 grade concentrate, they have the required diameter of 10 to 18 mm and an iron content of 65+%, which meets the requirements of European consumers. In addition, the modernization of the equipment allows the company to reduce the cost of natural gas and electricity, as well as to reduce the amount of concentrate used for pellets by reducing the amount of rejects.
As Andrey Skachkov, CEO of Northern GOK, explained, the company’s specialists have been working to improve the pelletizing process since 2019. Operational improvement measures were taken to reduce natural gas consumption in 2021-2022, and the first stage of the modernization of the automatic process control system (APCS) was implemented in early 2023.
“The quality of pellets was also improved by the launch of a technological process for the production of concentrate with an iron content of 68% at the ore processing plant (MPP) No. 1. All of this allowed us to reorient our production for the European market despite the war, providing our employees with jobs in these turbulent times. At present, iron ore produced at Severstal is being ordered by steelmakers in Slovakia, Poland, Romania and Serbia,” the top manager said, as quoted by the press service.
“Metinvest is a vertically integrated group of steel and mining companies. The group’s enterprises are located mainly in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Dnipro regions.
Metinvest’s major shareholders are SCM Group (71.25%) and Smart Holding (23.75%), which jointly manage the company.
Metinvest Holding LLC is the management company of Metinvest Group.
