Study on the reduction of Fe2O3 pellets by CO-CO2 and H2-H2O: Reaction kinetics and pore network model

The steel industry contributes to creating an environmentally friendly society by providing high-quality steel and working to develop low-carbon processes. Using hydrogen produced from renewable energy to replace part of coke in blast furnaces is one of the measures to reduce fossil carbon dioxide emissions in the process of steelmaking. In this paper, a series of reduction experiments of Fe2O3 pellets at different temperatures were carried out under three conditions of hydrogen-rich in blast furnace. The variation law between reduction degree and apparent activation energy was calculated. The result shows that when the reduction degree reaches 11% and 70%, the apparent activation energy reaches the peak, which are 38.9 kJ/mol and 19.5 kJ/mol, respectively. This suggests that the reduction process is affected by two or more mechanisms. Then, on the basis of the typical single interface reaction kinetics model, the multistep reduction kinetics model of hydrogen-rich reduction Fe2O3 pellets was established. In addition, based on the results of industrial computerized tomography (CT) analysis, the three-dimensional pore network model and velocity model of Fe2O3 pellets after reduction were established. The coupling relationship between the fractal dimension of pellet pores and reduction atmosphere was studied by introducing fractal theory. Under hydrogen-rich reduction condition, the volume fractal dimension of pore structure of Fe2O3 pellets increases from 2.41 to 2.58. Therefore, the pore structure formed by hydrogen-rich reduction is conducive to the diffusion of reducing gas in the pellet, so as to improve the reduction degree of pellet.