A steel industry game

NRRI Research Technician Dan Carrigan – with Senior Research Technician Steve Zaitz – sizes green balls to be fired in the Pot Grate furnace for a research project.

A bicycle ride between two northern Minnesota minerals researchers may turn into one of the domestic steel industries biggest steps forward.

Researchers at the Natural Resources Research Institute (NRRI) Coleraine lab, a minerals, metallurgy and biomass conversion laboratory in Coleraine, Minn., are testing engineered biocarbon that could replace some of the fossil carbon used in the production of steel in electric arc furnaces (EAFs), lab officials say.

“With the ongoing transition from blast furnaces to electric arc steelmaking, everyone in the industry is looking at how to reduce its carbon footprint,” said Kevin Kangas, Coleraine lab site director. “They’re looking at how to make feedstock for EAFs and how to have lower emissions in everything from the mine pit to the rail car.”

Replacing fossil fuels used in the domestic steel industry with carbon neutral biomass fuels – also called engineered biocarbon products – is a challenge.

Fossil fuels have since the steel industry’s inception, been the energy foundation and carbon source for domestic steelmaking.

Yet, domestic steelmakers in recent decades have already made significant progress in becoming greener.

The U.S. steelmaking industry is the cleanest and most energy efficient of the leading steel industries in the world, according to the Washington, D.C-based American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI).

A huge part of that is due to the use of domestically sourced iron ore pellets, the high percentage of steel made from recycled scrap, and an increased use of natural gas instead of coal and coke in steelmaking, resulting in lower emissions, according to the AISI.

But as steelmakers seek to become even greener, the demand for non-fossil carbon that offer reduced carbon emissions, is huge, said Kangas.

“There’s a lot of customers interested in a biomass product for this, that or the other thing,” said Kangas. “But they don’t know a lot of times even how to get started.”

That’s where the Coleraine lab comes in.

The lab, on 27 acres at a former U.S. Steel site near downtown Coleraine, performs research on innovative mining, processing and steelmaking techniques that help the state and nation’s taconite and steel industries.

The lab performs bench scale tests and pilot level testing aimed at taking ideas to commercial usage.

A $4 million U.S. Department of Energy grant is helping fuel the biomass/biocarbon project.

“It’s an exciting project,” said Rolf Weberg, NRRI executive director. “We were rewarded for having a really, really good proposal that takes the biocarbon, if you will, and making it amenable for use in an electric arc furnace.”

The biomass research at Coleraine is focused on turning renewable products into a form that can be fed into EAFs, Weberg said.

Renewable fuels for the EAF industry could potentially be made from wood, agriculture waste or other renewable resources.

At Coleraine, the current focus is on woody biomass.

But because some renewable products are light in weight and blow around if introduced into an EAF in raw form, the material needs to be formed into a product that doesn’t blow around within an EAF, said Weberg.

A renewable EAF fuel could come in the form of a briquette, pellets, or another form, said Weberg.

Brett Spigarelli, metallurgical engineer at the Coleraine lab, says the biocarbon EAF feed being developed at the lab, is made from Minnesota-produced renewable products.

“What we’re making is engineered biocarbon products,” said Spigarelli. “If successful, it will be able to replace likely in EAFs upwards of 90 percent of the coal being used, but it won’t be able to replace things like natural gas. But we’re hoping it will be a replacement for anywhere fossil carbon is being used in the facilities. We will be making tons of biocarbon on-site in Coleraine and be shipping it to our project partners at a Nucor facility and it will be put into their commercial grade EAFs.”

Interesting enough, the idea to develop a biocarbon product in Coleraine came during a gravel bicycle ride in which Spigarelli and Matt Mlinar, Coleraine lab interim minerals and metallurgy researcher and group leader, began talking about the project, said Spigarelli.

“Matt and I were out riding throwing ideas back and forth,” said Spigarelli. “It was kind of dumb luck, but we’re always thinking about ways we can utilize our resources.”

Research and testing at the lab has led to development of a biocarbon product that’s dense enough and holds enough energy to be used in EAF’s, said Mlinar.

“Our innovation is where we found that through our technology we are able to replicate some of the chemical, physical and metallurgical properties of fossil fuels using woody biomass,” said Mlinar.

Whoever comes up with a product that works efficiently in EAFs, will have a massive market for the product, said Weberg.

And Minnesota, through the NRRI, hopes to be on the leading edge.

“If you look at iron and steel in general, Minnesota has a really wonderful opportunity to make a global impact in carbon emissions by really accelerating the idea of green iron,” said Weberg. “That starts with taking a green electron and making green iron out of it. It’s an exciting concept, but the devil is in the details. Those are the pieces that NRRI, because we’ve invested across the entire institute, are poised to partner with the state government and federal government and beyond to bring those kind of opportunities to Minnesota.”

Minnesota, the NRRI, its Coleraine lab and its forestry and water resource groups in Hermantown, are all working together in researching and developing biomass EAF products, said Weberg.

Developing a biomass product that can be produced on a large scale would be a game-changer for the region, state, nation, and steel industry, he said.

“It’s exciting because it’s fitting into a bigger conversation that is initiating across northern Minnesota,” said Weberg. “The idea of industrial decarbonization is a national and international conversation now, and Minnesota, because of what we’re doing and the resources we have, could be a significant focal point for industrial carbonization in the United States.”

Although some carbon will always be needed in steelmaking to achieve the strength requirements needed in steel, decarbonizing the industry – or defossilizing it – continues to make strides, said Kangas.

And that remains a focus of NRRI, said Kangas.

“People talk about making green steel and how that has to be done,” said Kangas. “You can talk about hydrogen, but we don’t have the supply right now, so we have to work on that. And you can talk about biocarbon and that’s where our research is focused right now, in eliminating the use of fossil carbon with biocarbon and that’s not simple. But that’s where we’re going.”

The NRRI biocarbon research could have far-reaching benefits, said Weberg.

“I love the word opportunity,” said Weberg “It’s an opportunity for Minnesota to lead and make an impact on the nation and globally. And it helps us increase our portfolio of value products from iron here in the state, which is good for the economy, good for jobs, and frankly, good for the environment as well.”

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A mix of clouds and sun. A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible. High 77F. Winds WSW at 5 to 10 mph..

A stray shower or thunderstorm is possible early. Some clouds. Low 58F. Winds NNW at 5 to 10 mph.

Updated: August 28, 2023 @ 1:08 pm

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