3671
High-Purity Iron Preparation Process: Research and Technology
Jie Liu, Wencheng Ge, Yanjun Li, Yongsheng Sun, Shumin Zhang,
Yuexin Han, Tianjiao Chang, Yimin Zhu
College of Resource and Civil Engineering, Northeastern University, Shenyan, PR China
ABSTRACT: With the development of powder metallurgy and high-end steel products, the demand for high-
purity iron concentrates continues to increase. This paper establishes a feasible evaluation system for preparing
high-purity iron concentrates by analyzing the inherent relationship between the mineralogy characteristics
of the raw materials and beneficiation indicators. The accuracy of the system was verified through practical
engineering cases, and the production process was then optimized. The results show that the evaluation system
was available, successfully developing a new technology for deep impurity removal from iron concentrate, and
achieving the optimal utilization of high-quality iron ore.
Keywords: High-purity iron concentrate process mineralogy magnetite liberation mineral occlusion deep
impurity removal reverse flotation ethyl amine collector, weak magnetic separation electromagnetic beneficia-
tion optionality rating system direct reduction iron electric furnace rapid low-carbon iron smelting
INTRODUCTION
As the most critical structural and functional material, steel
plays a vital role in the rapid economic development of the
country (Wandebori and Murtyastanto, 2023). However,
China’s steel industry faces the problem of a lack of product
features and a severe surplus of mid to low-end products
(Brandt et al., 2008 Chalabyan et al., 2018). Furthermore,
with the development of the steel industry, China’s demand
for high-end steel products has been increasing generally
(Der heiden and Thomas, 2013). Therefore, under the
guidance of the “dual carbon” strategy of China, it has
become a pressing task for the steel industry to achieve effi-
cient green transformation and development through tech-
nological innovation (Zhang et al., 2023). High-quality
steel production mainly adopts the traditional smelting
process combining blast furnace and converter (Cavaliere
and Cavaliere, 2019 Pang et al.). This process has the dis-
advantage of being complex, challenging production, and
high energy consumption (He and Wang, 2017 Perpiñán
et al., 2023). Kiessling first proposed clean steel in 1962,
which refers to preparing high-end steel by strictly control-
ling the content of impurity elements such as hydrogen,
oxygen, and low-melting point metals. The production of
clean steel requires high-quality iron source raw materials,
such as clean molten steel or clean steel-based materials
(Kiessling, 1980). However, production is limited by the
typical characteristics of poor-quality of iron ore resources.
Although the iron concentrate processed through com-
plex mineral processing processes meets the needs of blast
furnace smelting, the molten iron obtained from smelt-
ing usually contains many impurities (Zhou et al., 2022).
When using this as raw material to produce clean steel, the
presence of impurities makes it challenging to control the
properties of the steel. In addition, industrial pure iron can
also be used to produce clean steel. However, the clean steel
production is severely restricted by its high import price.