Clear Skies Over Mariupol. Metinvest Completed the largest environmental project in Ukraine
Metallurgical production has always been one of the biggest polluters of the environment. However, this problem can be solved if there is a desire to change the situation for the better
Metinvest Group has completed a large-scale environmental modernization of the Ilyich Iron and Steel Works' sintering plant in Mariupol. The project was implemented for more than seven years, and its cost was over $160 million, making it the largest environmental project in the history of Ukraine.
According to Yuriy Ryzhenkov, CEO of Metinvest Group, with this project the Group proved that it knows how to keep its word, because it was implemented despite the crisis and the coronavirus pandemic, which also made its adjustments to the work. "I am grateful to everyone who worked on this, without exaggeration, historical modernization all these years. Now the sintering plant at Ilyich Iron and Steel Works is not only the largest in Europe, but also the most environmentally friendly and modern," he said.
During the modernization, modern equipment and technologies of the Italian company Termokimik Corporation were used, and the domestic company Metinvest-Engineering acted as the general contractor of the project. At the same time, the modernization of equipment took place at the operating production, and the installation of cyclones and bag filters - structures weighing hundreds of tons - was carried out in the shortest possible time. There are no analogues of such modernization of gas cleaning systems at sintering plants in the world.
After the reconstruction, the sky over Mariupol will become much cleaner. After all, previously 80% of all enterprise emissions and up to 40% of dust emissions in Mariupol went to the sintering plant. And after modernization, dust emissions will decrease by 90%, and sulfur emissions - by 46%.
The project involved the creation of a complex two-stage gas cleaning system. At the first stage, coarse dust cleaning takes place, when large particles are captured, and dust, which is fine ore particles, is sent for reuse in production. This work is performed by modern Hurriclone cyclones. And at the second stage, the gas is further cleaned of the smallest dust particles and sulfur compounds, powerful bag filters cope with this task, providing a reduction in emissions by more than 10 times. "The standards provided for the level of dust emissions from the sintering plant up to 300 mg/cubic meter, and our gas scrubbers now provide 15-20 mg/cubic meter with 50 mg/cubic meter established by Ukrainian legislation," said Andriy Panchenko, head of the sintering plant modernization project.
The project was implemented on time, despite difficulties. In particular, in early spring, due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs recalled all foreign specialists from Ukraine. This happened at the very moment when Termokimik Corporation employees were supposed to install software and perform cold and hot scrolling of the aspiration system equipment. Only by mid-summer, when the epidemic subsided, Italian specialists were able to return to Ukraine, complete the equipment setup, and the project was finally completed.
At the same time, today, specialists from Metinvest-Engineering continue to modernize the "Speyk" electrostatic precipitators and install two bag filters in the cooling zone of agglomeration plant No. 1. These works will be completed this year and are additional commitments to reduce harmful emissions that the plant has undertaken.
However, the environmental modernization of the enterprise will not stop there. According to Taras Shevchenko, General Director of Ilyich Iron and Steel Works, the next step will be the blast furnace division. After all, reducing the environmental burden on the city is one of the priority tasks that Metinvest sets for itself.