Pilot Plants for the Agglomeration of Iron Ores on a Semi-Industrial Scale

INCREASING portions of the iron ores extracted from the mines are submitted to agglomeration - processes such as sintering and pelletising prior to their smelting in the blast furnace. These processes have been developed in order to agglomerate iron-containing fines such as the portion of fine ore, fine grained concentrates obtained during the concentration of low-grade iron ores or waste products, e.g. flue dust, mill scale, cinders, etc. Moreover, it has proved that the blast furnace operation can considerably be improved if sinter or pellets are used as the reducibility of the agglomerates is generally better than that of the raw ore and as the water and carbonic acid are already expelled in the preparation plant.