Current situation of carbon emissions and countermeasures in China’s ironmaking industry

Abstract

The iron and steel industry (ISI) involves high energy consumption and high pollution. ISI in China, a leading country in the ISI, consumed 15% of the country’s total energy and produced more than 50% of the global ISI’s carbon emissions. Therefore, in the context of global low-carbon economy and emission reduction requirements, low-carbon smelting technology in the ISI has attracted increasingly more attention in China. This review summarizes the current status of carbon emissions and energy consumption in China’s ISI and discusses the development status and prospects of low-carbon ironmaking technology. The main route to effectively reducing carbon emissions is to develop a gas-based direct reduction process and replace sintering with pelletizing, both of which focus on developing pelletizing technology. However, the challenge of pelletizing process development is to obtain high-quality iron concentrates. Consequently, the present paper also summarizes the development status of China’s mineral processing technology, including fine-grained mineral processing technology, magnetization roasting technology, and flotation collector application. This paper aims to provide a theoretical basis for the low-carbon development of China’s ISI in terms of a dressing–smelting combination.