CASE STUDY

Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal uses Rocky DEM to optimize material charging into a blast furnace

Offering innovative solutions faster than the competition is the best way to stay ahead in a challenging industry like steel. Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corporation (NSSMC), a world-leading integrated steel producer based in Japan, understands that quick and error-free processes are needed to stay competitive in the market place. One of their recent challenges was to optimize the process of material charging into a blast furnace, which converts iron ore and coke materials into pig iron (Figure 1). The charging/discharging process is known to cause segregation and other flow issues due to the differences in size, density, and shape of the granular materials charged. However, as the furnace produces reduction gas at a very high temperature, it is impossible to visually observe this process. Therefore, NSSMC uses a combination of both experimental tests and computer simulations in their analyses, and chose Rocky DEM software due in part to its ability to simulate realistic polygon shapes.

NIPPON STEEL & SUMITOMO METAL

Blast furnace at NSSMC - Image provided by NSSMC

Rocky’s non-sphere, full-polygon particle function

was for our company the deciding factor for

DEM software selection. Additionally, we appreciate

that we can use GPUs to process DEM simulations

with accurate and high-speed results. And by

inputting several simulation files into the Rocky Scheduler

tool, we can easily calculate many simulations as a series process, saving us even more

time and effort.”

Yoichi NaritaResearcher at NSSMC

Figure 1: Diagram of a blast furnace showing where in the charging process DEM simulations were used

CASE STUDY

www.rocky-dem.com | © Rocky DEM, Inc. - All rights reserved.

Figure 3: Rocky DEM simulation of coke-shaped particles being packed - Image provided byNSSMC

With the aim of realizing the world-top-class competitiveness, Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal has made steady progress in integrating technologies, reducing costs by raising efficiency, consolidating facilities and organizations and developing overseas businesses. NSSMC is supported by Rocky DEM Channel Partner StayShift, Japan.

Figure 2: Photographs of different coke particles, one of the two material types simulated by NSSMC in Rocky - Images provided by NSSMC

CHALLENGEOptimize materials charging into a blast furnace by performing experimental and computer tests that both reduces costs while obtaining the best results.

SOLUTIONBy using Rocky DEM simulations, NSSMC gained more insight into the angular particles’ flow and packing behavior. Rocky DEM is expected to contribute greatly to the improved operation of the blast furnace.

BENEFITSOnce Rocky made it possible for NSSMC to evaluate the behavior of their non-sphere-based particle shapes, they were able to understand better the material flow conditions, which saved them experiment costs and ensured better results faster.

For their simulations, NSSMC used Rocky’s unique, non-spherical shape abilities to create particles that more accurately represented the irregular shapes of its sintered iron ore and coke materials (Figures 2 and 3). These shape abilities, coupled with Rocky’s fast GPU processing and multi-job scheduler, enabled NSSMC to solve and analyze their cases quickly and with higher accuracy.

By using Rocky as their Discrete Element Method (DEM) tool, the researchers at NSSMC now have a better understanding of material flow conditions and other transient phenomena occurring within the equipment that was not possible to analyze with experiments alone. In addition, they are starting to research how the non-sphere, realistic particle shapes affects the segregation and void fraction of each material, both of which are very important issues for blast furnace operation. “With Rocky, we can now evaluate the behavior of non-sphere-based, realistically shaped particles in a quantitative way,” says Mr. Narita.

NIPPON STEEL & SUMITOMO METAL

By starting off with smaller, quicker, and less expensive kg-order scale laboratory experiments, the researchers can then scale-up their testing with bigger ton-order experiments. Nevertheless, as these experiments are more expensive and time consuming, DEM simulations offer a more practical time and cost saving option. “This experiment-simulation combination is a vital process for determining the ideal operating procedure of the actual blast furnace,” says Yoichi Narita, Researcher at NSSMC. “Due to the high cost and long amount of time involved with doing large-scale experiments, the number of such experiments is very limited. DEM simulation is a great complement to these difficulties.”