Page 72 - Steel Tech India eMagazine Volume April 2022

VOL. 16 • NO. 3 • April 2022

would indirectly decarbonize the value chain. Mr. B P Sarkar:
Our manganese ore is mostly low grade from
where ferromanganese and silico-manganese are
produced. there are processes to make use of these
low grade ores to generate other products such as
MnSO4, MncO3, Gamma MnO2 and also electrolytic
manganese metal (eMM) using hydro-metallurgical
processes. As it is mentioned earlier for producing one
tonne of high carbon ferromanganese we generate 4.5
tonne of cO2 but if we produce these chemicals through
hydro-metallurgical route then the cO2 generation
reduces to half. If we produce such useful products Mr Sarkar welcomed the audiences once again in
which will finally go to the battery market, then we are the seminar and mentioned about Steel tech how
effectively reducing generation of cO2, which will be he started it in 2006 with late Dr Amit chatterjee a
a great service to the society. DrKundu suggested the metallurgist of repute and a great leader in the steel
ferroalloy industry to seriously look into these exciting fraternity. he also mentioned about the quality and
new products and markets which will increase its content of Steel tech which was appreciated by
profitability, decarbonize the be sustainable in future. many including the Steel Secretary, Ministry of Steel,
Not only that it will also reduce its dependability on GoI as one of the best technical journal content wise.
the cyclic nature of profitability of the steel industry for then he shared his rich experiences with FAMD (Ferro
the future growth and sustainability of the ferro-alloy Alloys and Mineral Division) of tata Steel where he
industry. joined as head Product and technology in the last 3
years of his career. he also mentioned that officers
the slag produced in the ferroalloys plants are dumped. working in FAMD were very dynamic and have risen to
But these slags can be used in making bitumen roads very high posts in steel industry and also few became
which are tested by tata Steel with ferrochrome slag entrepreneurs and one of them started an integrated
and is already approved by Odisha PWD. DrKundu steel plant in India. he shared his experiences how he
also mentioned these aggregates have already used developed value added items for domestic as well as
in making a concrete helipad and bitumen road as pilot export markets while in FAMD. he always had an eye
projects. One more application of ferrochrome slag for improving the efficiency of a process and utilizing
could be to use them in refractory. by-products and suggested to use the flue gases of

he finally opined the ferroalloy industry is not just to Bamnipal close type furnace which contain 80% cO for
serve steel industry but in addition to make value added generating power as being done in DRI units. he also
products which can serve other industries not just only worked on utilizing overburden of Suknida mines for
for profit but also for serving the society by reducing extracting Nickel and Cobalt with the help of Regional
GhG emission and being more sustainable. It will also Research laboratory, Bhubaneswar. Although the
reduce our dependency on imports e.g. GammaMnO2 trials were successful in the pilot plant at RRl but due
which is not being produced here in India but mostly to high capex the plant couldn’t be set up. Mr. Sarkar
imported from china who has almost monopoly in the suggested to look in to this project once again as
the prices of Nickel has gone up internationally quite
market. India has the raw material but needs a little substantially(delete) and the investment will be worth
more thinking, innovation and a risk-taking approach to its value. The demand of Nickel and Cobalt will be there
develop new processes. For this we need to go through for battery manufacturing. the bye-product will be pig
a process of making first pilot plants, prove the concept iron which is again a value added product from these
and then go for commercial units. here DrKundu opined overburden.
to get closely associated with the start-up companies,
academia and OeMs. he then suggested to make use of huge deposit of non-
coking coal in India to generate power at reasonable
Dr. Kundu’s talk was hugely appreciated by the cost and use it in steel making and other industries as it
audience. is not possible to make green hydrogen in commercial

70 Steel tech