Miner and steelmaker Evraz has completed the overhaul of blast furnace No.3 at its Evraz ZSMK plant, the company says.

The overhaul will enable the production of 6,800 tonnes of pig iron per day, Kallanish notes. Total investments amounted to RUB 250 million ($3.4m),

The upgrade will increase the productivity of the unit, increase the turnaround time and reduce the impact of blast furnace production on the environment, the enterprise claims.

During the repair, which lasted eight days, the charging device was completely replaced, through which the charge enters the blast furnace. The power supply and other technological equipment was also repaired. 

“We are trying to make production as environmentally friendly as possible,” said the head of the coke-and-blast furnace segment of the Siberia division Sergey Burylin. “This is our first experience, and in future we plan to apply it to other furnaces."

Evraz expects second-quarter pig iron production to slightly increase following the completion of equipment downtime at Evraz ZSMK (see Kallanish passim).

The company's first-quarter consolidated crude steel output fell 1.7% quarter-on-quarter and 4.2% year-on-year to 3.4 million tonnes, mainly due to unscheduled downtime at the sintering machine at Evraz ZSMK. Pig iron production decreased by 5.9% on-quarter and 5.1% on-year to almost 2.7mt.