The Pelletising Plant processes iron ore into pellets for use in the Blast Furnaces. We can substantially reduce the emissions of this production process by means of a DeNOx installation and a dust removal plant. This new high-tech environmental installation, involving a total investment of EUR 200 million, is expected to reduce lead, heavy metals and dust emissions at the Pelletising Plant by approx. 80% in 2023 compared to 2019.

Clean more quickly
In order not to lose momentum, we have separated the construction of the dust removal plant from that of the DeNOx installation. This will allow us to commission the dust removal plant in 2023 and accelerate lead, heavy metals and dust emission reductions.

How does it work?
The flue gases that are released during the production of pellets are transported to the new dust removal plant through a special pipeline. This pipeline is 140 metres long and has a diameter of 6 metres. This is comparable to the cross section of a tunnel tube of the North-South line tunnel in Amsterdam. The dust removal plant itself consists of more than 6,000 filter bags, all together more than 60 km long, which subsequently clean the flue gases to reduce the emission of dust and heavy metals at the Pelletising Plant.

30% fewer nitrogen oxides
The second part, the DeNOx installation, will be commissioned in 2025. With this installation, we will reduce nitrogen oxide emissions at the Pelletising Plant by as much as 30%. For this, we use a new technology that has not yet been applied on this scale elsewhere in the steel industry.

We are exploring options to further reduce the emission of nitrogen oxides (NOx) We are conducting an investigation at the source, the blast furnace and coke oven gas. The objective is to reduce the nitrogen content in these gases so that less NOx will be emitted during combustion. The research phase has been completed and we have started the feasibility studies. As soon as this becomes concrete, feasible and practical, it will be included on the Roadmap Plus general map.