The situation is different at our Timoteo unit, our largest unit and the only one using blast furnaces, which represent nearly 90% of Aperam’s total dust emissions. Because the unit has replaced the use of coke with environmentally-friendly charcoal, which is lighter and easily blown by wind, dust containment is particularly challenging.
To overcome this challenge, new upgrades were required. Since 2017, short-term actions have been launched on critical chimneys and our main de-dusting systems. Key achievements include the full covering of charcoal conveyors, replacement of clogged or leaking ducts and many (thousands!) of filtering bags, and maintenance for the blast furnaces’ dedusting installation.In 2018, we adopted a five-year roadmap with carefully phased revamps of installations and related investments, significant reengineering and planned production stoppages.
Since then, we have changed a number of dedusting sleeves and organised a camera-based surveillance and preventive maintenance of the key chimneys to keep the installations in good condition until a full refurbishment can be made. With this first action plan, the dust intensity of the unit was cut by two-thirds (based on 2016 levels). Progress continued in 2019.
As a result of initiatives like these, Aperam has achieved a significant reduction in our dust emissions – even in times of increased production. Our total consolidated emissions using regulatory methodologies indicate a -65% reduction in intensity in 2019 over 2015, which corresponds to dust emissions of 84 grams per ton of crude steel produced. Our company objective is to keep progressing and we aim to reach 70 grams per ton by 2030.