A method for operating a blast furnace is presented, said method comprising the steps of collecting a stream of blast furnace gas from the blast furnace; feeding said stream of blast furnace gas and a hydrocarbon containing gas to a reforming plant comprising at least one reformer; reforming said stream of blast furnace gas and said hydrocarbon containing gas in the reforming plant en to produce a stream of syngas; and feeding at least a portion of said stream of syngas to the blast furnace; wherein a stream of h % is added to the hydrocarbon containing gas before step (c) and/or to the stream of blast furnace gas before step (c) and/or to the stream of syngas before step (d) and/or to the tuyere of the blast furnace, wherein the feeding of at least a portion of said stream of syngas to the blast furnace occurs through the shaft of the blast furnace and/or through the tuyere of the blast furnace, and wherein the utilization efficiency of the hydrogen in a blast furnace plant comprising the blast furnace, the reforming plant and a cowper plant is above 60%.

An agglomerated ore that is a molded product obtained by mixing a plurality of types of particles, wherein the plurality of types of particles includes at least iron carbide particles and iron oxide particles, wherein at least some of the iron oxide particles are exposed on a surface layer of the agglomerated ore, wherein the porosity of the agglomerated ore is 20% or more and 40% or less, wherein the ratio of the total mass of metallic iron and iron in iron carbide to the mass of total iron contained in the agglomerated ore is 40 mass % or more and 80 mass % or less, and wherein the concentration of carbon including carbon in the iron carbide particles is 1.0 mass % or more and 4.5 mass % or less.

A system for the production of sponge iron, including a direct reduction shaft, a reduction gas source, a reduction gas container, a primary circuit for conducting at least a part of a top gas therethrough, a secondary circuit for conducting at least a portion of gas removed from gas conducted through the primary circuit, said secondary circuit being connected in one end to the primary circuit and in another end to the reduction gas container, a second gas line connecting the reduction gas source with the reduction gas container, and a third gas line connecting the reduction gas container with the first gas line. The system also includes a control unit configured to control a flow of reduction gas from reduction gas source to the first gas line and to control a flow of reduction gas from the reduction gas container to the first gas line through the third gas line, wherein the control unit is configured to enable a flow of reduction gas from the reduction gas container to said first gas line while correspondingly reducing a flow rate of reduction gas from the reduction gas source to said first gas line.

Herein discussed is a method of producing hydrogen comprising introducing a metal smelter effluent gas or a basic oxygen furnace (BOF) effluent gas or a mixture thereof into an electrochemical (EC) reactor, wherein the EC reactor comprises a mixed-conducting membrane. In an embodiment, the method comprises introducing steam into the EC reactor on one side of the membrane, wherein the effluent gas is on the opposite side of the membrane, wherein the effluent gas and the steam are separated by the membrane and do not come in contact with each other.

Method of operating a blast furnace installation comprising a top gas recycle blast furnace and hot stones, whereby a hydrocarbon containing fuel is transformed into a transformed gas stream consisting mainly of CO and H.sub.2 and substantially devoid of hydrocarbon, whereby a low-heating-value gaseous fuel is generated comprising a mixture of the transformed gas with a portion of the CO.sub.2-rich tail gas obtained by decarbonatation of the blast furnace gas, and whereby the low-heating-value fuel is used to heat the hot furnace gas is heated before being injected into the blast-furnace.

Processes that generate syngas or reformed gas that have the desired H2/CO ratio, such that they can be used directly for producing higher value liquids, such as using a FT GTL process. The systems and methods of the present invention are simpler and more cost effective than conventional systems and methods. The systems and methods of the present invention generate the required CO2 in a reforming furnace by combusting natural gas with a mixture of O2 from an external source and CO2 that is recirculated from a reforming furnace. A second application of the natural gas combustion with external O2 mixed with recirculated CO2 in the reformer burners can be utilized in a DR process. The reformed gas or syngas containing H2 and CO is used to reduce iron oxide to metallic iron in a shaft furnace, for example.

Blast furnace installation having top gas recycling and process for operating same, in which the oxygen concentration of the oxidizing gas injected into the blast furnace is regulated as a function of the flow rate of the recycled top gas.

The present disclosure relates to a process for producing an iron melt. The method includes; reducing iron ore to sponge iron, carburizing sponge iron with a carbonaceous gas, melting the carburized sponge iron and/or treating the melt produced from the carburized sponge iron. According to the present disclosure, the carbonaceous gas is at least a portion of the process gas obtained in the melting of the carburized sponge iron and/or treating of the melt produced from the carburized sponge iron that has been recycled.

A direct reduction process producing DRI from iron oxide particles by reduction at a about 750? C. with a reducing gas mainly H.sub.2 and CO, that also includes CO.sub.2, H.sub.20, and methane, a the reduction reactor and the top gas effluent from the reduction reaction after cooling/scrubbing is split. The resulting first top gas portion with a first hydrocarbon-containing make-up gas passes through a catalytic reformer yielding an improved hot reducing gas first effluent. The second top gas portion passes through a CO.sub.2 removal unit and then with the second hydrocarbon-containing make-up gas passes through a heater yielding a hot CO.sub.2-lean recycle reducing gas second effluent. The first and second effluents are fed to the reducing zone of the reduction reactor as the reducing gas reactant. The flow rate of at least the second of the two make-up gases is regulated to control the carbon content of the DRI produced.

The invention relates to a process for producing carburized directly reduced iron sponge from iron oxide material. Firstly, direct reduction is carried out by means of a reduction gas consisting at least predominantly of H.sub.2 and the carbon content in the iron sponge is then increased by means of a carburizing gas which is fed in, after which used carburizing gas is at least partly taken off while largely avoiding mixing with the reduction gas. The plant for producing carburized directly reduced iron sponge from iron oxide material comprises a reduction zone for directly reducing introduced iron oxide material to directly reduced product by means of reduction gas consisting predominantly of H.sub.2 and a reduction gas feed conduit opening into the reduction zone. It also comprises a carburization zone having a carburizing gas feed conduit opening into the carburization zone and a carburization offgas conduit.