Corus Ore Preparation Plant - Sinter Process

Corus Construction & Industrial is part of the Long Products Division w ithin the Corus group. The Scunthorpe site is an integrated steel plant, providing steel to construction, e ne rg y, sh ip bu ild in g an d e n gin ee rin g industries w orldw ide. H ot m etal Iron (hot m etal) produced at Scunthorpes iron works is further refined at the works steelm aking plant before being rolled at one of its rolling m ills into various structural sections including plate, wire rod, angles, channels and beam s. H ot m etal is produced by the blast furnaces from a com bination of iron ore, coke and lim estone. It is the careful blending and processing of raw m aterials, prior to charging into the furnaces, that allow s process efficiencies and product quality to be achieved. The blending and processing of the raw m aterials takes place at the Ore Preparation Plant (O PP ), which incorporates a blending plant, coal preparation plant and sinter plant. As part of an ongoing review of its activities across the OP P, C orus elected to m odernise the process c ontrol, visualizatio n and data acquisition technologies applied at the sinter plant, and in particular those associated with the sinter hood or ignition furnace. The sinter plant is a critical path process that continuously provides feedstock to the blast furnaces. Sintering is a production process, whereby sm all particles coalesce to form larger m asses, usually at high tem perature. This process benefits the blast furnace operation, as sintering avoids losses w hich would otherwise occur if the iron ore, coke and lim estone were fed into the blast furnace in a loose or powdered state. At Scunthorpe there are two sinter lines, referred to as strands. Each strand is 4.2 m etres wide x 0.55 m etres deep and 72.0 m etres long and processes 7,000 tonnes per day of sinter. Each strand has a sinter hood configured with six burners, firing C oke O ven G as. C ritical to the sintering process is the control of the sinter hood, its associated burners and the tem perature w ithin the furnace. Loss of the furnace will stop the process and fluctuating tem peratures affect the quality of the product produced. W ith reference to the process diagram (figure 1), the required blend of raw m aterials is first pelletized and then passed beneath the sinter hood, where it is ignited at a tem perature of 1080EC . The sinter travels along the bed of the strand, and whilst doing so, air is sucked through by a very large (4.9M W ) w aste gas fan. This allow s the sintering process to continue to burn dow n through the bed. At the end of the sinter strand, the lum ps of sinter are crushed to an optim ised size for feeding the blast furnaces. Process enhancem ent W hen C orus cam e to deciding how to approach the replacem ent of the sinter hood control system , careful consideration had to be given to the availability and reliability of the selected logic solver and the ease of use of the hum an operator interface for this dire ct fired, m ultiple burner application. The replacem ent solution w ould em ploy a state of the art Supervisory C ontrol and D ata A c q u isitio n (S C A D A ) s ys te m e m p lo yin g re d u n d a n t s e rv e rs a n d m u ltip le c lie n t w o rk sta tio n s dis trib ute d aro u n d v ario u s locations. Each sinter strand would require the burner m anagem ent sequence control and com bustion control strategies to be taken out of the Ferranti com puter and H oneywell based technologies and be engineered in the latest available safety P LC technology in accordance w ith current best practice. Each ignition furnace control system handles 320 digital signals, 80 analogue signals, m ultiple P ID loops and num erous graphics based operator interfaces to depict the burner sequence and com bustion control algorithm s. At C orus, safety is the num ber one priority and m aintaining rigorous safety regim es and practices at the Sinter P lant is vital. It is im portant that any future control system s serve to m aintain C orus high safety standards. G ood practice and proven partners In this regard C orus looked to apply the risk based m ethodologies and project life cycle described in Functional Safety standard EN 61508 to guide the project and the devices em ployed. M indful of the safety im plications associated with a hazardous process such as a furnace, and the significance of the sinterin g process to the Scunthorpe site, Corus turned to Charter Tech an independent integrator of Process and Safety Instrum ented System s (SIS). C harter Tech was acknowledged as having a proven track record in providing control solutions for this type of application. The program would rollout in two phases, over a two-year period, with each phase com pleted within a strict shutdow n period to m inim ize disruption to the sinter lines and consequently, the blast furnaces. U ltim ately, the final system c h a n g e o v e r a n d c o m m is s io n in g was accom plished within an intensive twenty four hour period. A longer stop period w ould require C orus to raise the tem perature in the ignition furnace over m any hours, during w hich tim e the production of one strand is lost. To evidence that the logic solver (PLC ) did not com prom ise the overall safety of the application, a T V R hineland safety certified PLC was specified by C harter T ech to control the safety-critical burner sequences. In ke eping with EN 61508 good practice the non safety critical com bustion control signals are controlled and m anaged by a separate logic solver. Evidencing com pliance D em onstrating com pliance to EN 61508 and evidencing the required risk reduction is accom plished using a safety file. The sinter plant safety file focuses on the BM S aspect of the project, which includes the failure rate data of the logic solver. This proves the PLC supports the target Safety Integrity Levels (S ILs), determ ined by C orus, for each Safety Instrum ented Function (SIF).This docum entary e v id e n c in g e x e rc is e a ls o in c lu d e s th e com pilation of clear and concise validation records pertaining to the hardware and software developm ent tasks. M anufacturing Engineer, M r M artin Harrison said C harter Tech have provided several com plex safety critical burner m anagem ent system s to C orus in the past, and it is their engineering com petence along with their thorough understanding of EN61508 that has seen them chosen as the preferred supplier of the system s for this project.