OPTIMISATION OF AN IRON-ORE INDURATOR R. J. Batterham (wemsen)*, J. A, Thurlby (wewsen)* and G. J. Thornton “CSIRO Division of Chemicel Engineering, PO Box 312, Clayton, Victoria 3168, Auswaia, Introduction nthe past ten years, Australis has experienced 2 major change in the pattern of its exports. Minerals accounted for only 8% of total exports in 1864, but the proportion had increased to 30% by 1974, Most of this change has been due to the development of huge deposits of iron ore, coal, and bauxite. The CSIRO Division of Chemical Engineering! is @ ppartof the Minerals Research Laboratory {0up and works in close association with Companies which process. Australia's The export of iron ore, one of the main (> 6mm), which,can be charged directly to blast furnaces, of as fines (< 6mm) which must be converted to 8 larger size to prevent excessive pressure drops. in Blast furnaces. This size. up-grading can be carried out either in sintor plants Which are generally sited at the stealworks, for in palitising plants preferably near the mine ‘site, This paper _concems the pellosing plant at Dampier operated by Hammersey ron Pty Lid, which i ‘one ofthe few targe capacity processes in ‘Australia, having’ throughput. much higher than” most Australian chemical processes. sections of the mineral trade, is from the Pilbara region of North West Australia. which includes two of the world’s largest mines, The product is sold as lump ore lle The Pe ising Plant Details of this plant have been given elsewhere? Ore (< 6mm) is blended and =] Fig 1—The induration machine Attar graduating from Molbourne University (PhD) in 1968, Robin Battezham (left) worked at the ICI Central Instrument Resoarch Laboratories at Reading before ‘moving to CSIRO. His main research interest Is Imineral processing plants. A graduato of Melbourne Univesity, BE (Chem) in 1962 and ME in 1976, J. A, Thurby (contre) sent nine years with Altona Petrochemical Company and Esso Aus- tralia before joining CSIRO. His current interests are process modeling end Gu. Thornton (right) spont several years inthe aircraft industry before joining CSIRO. Ho isan electronics engineer with nterestsin process control and systems engineering. the contol of large-scale ‘THE CHEMICAL ENGINEER, SEPTEMBER 1977 ‘ground to a very fine size to allow balling into moist “green” pellets which have poor hendling propertios and must be heat Iweated (indurated) at approximately 130°C to develop adequate strength Much of the bonding in the fred pellets results from reactions with amounts of lime which are added. et the grinding stage to ensure an adequate dispersion. ‘The firing process is complex?, involving the formation of ime-hematite-sicate ‘compounds which facilitate diffusion and {grain growth in the hematite particles ta form a hard pellet on cooling, with the ability to resist breakage in transport and handling The induration machine used at Dampier is shown ciagramatically in Fig 1. The moving grate is protected from excessive (gas temperatures by @ layer of previously fired pellets refered to. as the “hearth layer”. Green pellets ae sized by screening, placed on top of the hearth layer, and vey _move through the machine are successively heated gently. to. remove free water added in balling (33% of the machine), heated at @ higher temperature (600°C) to remove the chemically bound water contained in goethite in the ore (5% of the machine), and then fred at 1300°C for sutfciont time to allow the Strength to develop (28% of the machine) Finally, the pellets are cooled to reasonable handling temperatures. The gas flow pattern shown in Fig 1 lustrates the methods used to minimise energy consumption, which is about 1 tonne of fue! oil per 50 tonnes of product The machine ‘operates at maximum opacity and there is considerable incen- tive to increase the tonnage produced at an ‘acceptable quality of pele. The process is highly interactive, for example, alteration of the gas flows in the firing section of the machine will affect the gas conditions in the drying sections. This wil alter the bed temperatures in the drying zones, which will cause further changes as the bed moves into the firing zone. Such gross. interactions are ‘obvious to the operators but many process changes have subtle effects which opera {ore find dificult to assess and rectify. The ‘machine also has significant and vated ttansport delays not normally met in the process industries: the ore residence time 'S ono hour, yet the residence time of the {gas from ‘cooling through fing and through drying is only ten seconds. For control, the problem of delays ie further compounded by the extra delays involved in measuring the product quality. Samples fof fred pallet are analysed every two hhours and may pertain to operating Conditions up to thrae hours previously. Thus the general problem of Improving the economie performance ofthis process 629hhas two main aspects: (1) elimination or ‘amelioration of the effects of delays in the process, espacally on product quality, anc (2) elimination ofthe effects of interactions in the process that are too subtle for ‘operators to detect. "The approach has been to develop ‘an analytical model of the process to provide information “on the process Interactions and on the effect of various ‘operating strategies on machine. per- formance. The economics justify @ major cetfor, and several man-years have beon expended to date, particulary on the ‘experimental. side, 98 part of 2 joint esearch programmo by Hammersey Iron Pty Ltd and the CSIRO Division of Chem cal Engineering, The model building has raliod heavily fon results from pot-grate_ simulators laboratory-scale machines. which uso 2 small fixed bed of pellets which is Subjected to gas flows and temperatures similar to those on the plant. In eect, this provides the equivalent of 2 slug of material moving. through the. fullsca Machine." The method has been used fextonsively to. give information on ja drying rates? and the effects of time and temperature on the quality of pollet produced. The resuitant data can ‘also. be checked by instrumenting one Section of the real’ machine bed with thermocouples and following its passage through the machine. AS it is not easy to measure the gas flows on the machine, the related bed pressure drops. are measured, and, as 2 consequence, the comparison between pilot scale and the plant can never be complete. The development of steady-state made! has reached the stage where the ftfect of various operating parameters ‘can be defined and used to dafine fecanomic operating conditions. Even tually, this work will be extended to ‘cover the dynamics of the machine and will be used t0 determine whether optimal Contral polices exist and the extent to Which effects of ‘interactions and. time ‘olays can be minimised. Optimising Controt To satisfy immediate plant requirements, fan optimising controller has been deve Toped which is partly based on an ‘operational model of the process. The ‘model uses statements of logical relation Shipe betweon process variables (6g. 92s temperatures, pressure drops and flows) and the plant states (e.g. product quality at various depths in the bed, drying rates and bod tomperatures). The technique is Suited to. processes. where there frequent variations in process. con. Gitions and hence inthe process optimum. Ite. main advantage is that the control action specified fora given set of input is Unique, and a plant performance at least fequivalent to that obtained by the best process operator is possible. Conventional optimising algorithms using ill climbing techniques incon: junction with an analytical model cannot be used in this case because of the complexity of the process. Evolutionary ‘optimising methods are also inappropriate a it is not possible to maintain machine Conditions steady enough to observe the 20 effect of chenges to process variables. The section of the control scheme developed forthe firing zones uses an on line estimate of the peliet quality and thereby avoids the main delay in the ‘process, whioh is the measurement of pellet quality. Detals of the optimising ‘Controller have been published elsewhere" ‘The present paper concentrates on the full analytical model of the machine and some fof tho rosults of computer simulations With a brief description of the on-lino ‘Quality preditor which uses 9 smaller, but Similar, heat transfer model for the firing On-Line Quality Predictor (Firing Zone Operation) To predict the temperature profiles of pellets st various depths in the bed as the pellets move through the machine, @ heat ttansfer model has been developed which Uses the measured hood and winsbox temperatures (i.e. the temperature of gases entering and leaving the bed) {ogether with the observed pressure drops across the bed. At any given location in the machine (ie. at any given ‘windbox) the bed is divided into a humber ‘of horizontal elements and the gas and pellet tomperstures ate calculated for each element. The physical size of each element fs Kept small enough to keep the model equations linear. (As only the firing section contributes to pellet quality. the ‘drying section is ignored) No allowance has been made for such second order effects as axial dispersion in the gas, lateral mixing ofthe ges. channel- ling’ through the bed, and conduction through the bed. Radiation has been included ‘but generally has lite sign ficane® except for the top layer which is ‘exposed tothe oil flame in the hood above the bed, ‘Various other restrictions apply. Thus ‘the model assumes a uniform pect size, no temperature distribution within the pellets, ‘and. 2 uniform bed height along tho machine (ie. no bed shrinkage in the firing zone) Tits simplest form, the model est- mates the rate of heat transfor from tho {998 10 the pellets and the heat balance Betwoon tho gas and the pellets. The rate equations aro. simplified by using Several lumped parameters; viz constants, Known functions of temperature. which ‘compensate for changing physical prop. fenios, and factors which depend on the bed geometry and which relate the observed pressure drops to the actual ‘unmeasured gas mass flows. These lumped parameters are updated on-line so that Predicted gas tomperatures leaving the bed egree with plant observation. Having calculated the pellet tempera- tutes throughout the firing zone, @ state ‘equation is used to estimate the resulting pellet quality. This equation predicts the Influence of any arbitrary time-tempera- ture profile on the pellet quality produced. Each of the on-line models has been tested extensively against data generated ‘on pot-grate simulators where the temper- Stures at various levels inthe bed. are known, together with the resulting pellet quality, Figure 2 shows the predicted and observed bed temperatures for tho fring zone for atypical run. (The cooling zone that follows is essentially 2 miror image) I'has been shown that the agreement is better than that obtained using simplar models! which donot. allow. for the effect of temperature on physical proper- Figure 2 also shows how pellets at the top of the bed reach @ higher firing temperature than pellets. lower down and” that. this higher tempersture is, maintained longer. As a consequence there is a range of qualities produced in the bed with pellets at tho bottom being of lowest quality. Thus the pellets ‘which form the “hearth layer” must come from previously fred pellets of adequate quality, 8s the bottom of tho bed shows Title or no increase in quality in one passage through the machine. ’As mentioned earlier, the contol scheme based on plant operational logic and the folatively ‘simple on-line models is 8 method of optimising the process which oes not involve the laborious step of Goveloping a full analytical model of the process. Fig 2—Measured and predicted temperature profiles forthe firing section ‘THE CHEMICAL ENGINEER, SEPTEMBER 1977Full Plant Simulation (Drying, ‘and Cooling), “The objective of this portion of the research has been to provide an off-line ‘model that can be ‘used for optimal Control studies and ‘also to. perform Strategic ‘model-based “plant tials” 10 etermine the optimum ‘operating con- Gitions, og. optimum ratio of bed and hearth layer heights versus grate spoc freon all size and bed. porosity inter Actions, the importance of fan capacitios, ‘ate. Those trials are cheaper and can cover wider conditions than those acceptable on the actual plant, without the risk of lost production. ‘The model covers the entire machine (atving, fring, and cooling) and includes radiation effects, influence of free water, ehydration of gosthite and othar hygrated minerals, limesand calcination and fring reactions. In the drying section, the predicted drying rates are compared with the maximum rates that pellets can Sus: tain without exploding (spalling) due to the pressure of steam within the pellets, This’ prediction of spalling is essential in ‘any realistic. simulation as, on the plant Seale, contol of spaling can dominate the ‘whole operation Asin the on-line model, certain assumptions are made, viz uniform pellet Size, bed geometry, bed height. and gas distribution across the bed. The grate and Understucture are considered as 8 number fof elements, with heat transfer within an flement by convection and where approp- fiate by radiation; heat conducted between the elements is also taken into ‘account Radiation to and through the bed and conduction through the bed are included inthe model but do not have a great effect fon pellet temperature profiles. The Simulation is handled. in two. separate but related computer programs. "In the first, caleulations are made using a specified set of gas temperatures and compositions entering the bed together ‘with specified mase flows oF pressure ‘ops. The predicted outlet ges conditions {rom each bed element are blended to calculate windbox flows, enthalpies, and Compositions. This. program allows ‘xploration of effects of the main variabios ‘on spalling and pellet quality, e.g. tho effects of bad inlet temperatures, flow rates, pellet moistures and. size, bed porosity, and grate speed. However, it does fot calculate overall heat and mass balances or give any indication of the feasibility of the chosen conditions. Results of this open loop simulation show satisfactory agreement with data {generated in pot-grate simulators, and, as far as can be observed, with the full sal plant. Figures 2 and 3, which cover the firing and drying sections respectively, compere experimental and simulated results The second computer program is for recycle flow and. incorporates. the fist program for calculation of pellet tempera {ures and bed outlet temperatures. Opera ofthis program is best understoad by referring to Fig 1. On completion of the bed. calculations, the gas flows leaving tach bed element are blended to give flow fates, enthalpies and. temperatures of the stream passing from the first Cooling Table—The Ranges used inthe Simulations Variable Units Type. Lowest «Base Highest value state value Tonnage Tonnes/in Fixed = 400 ea Bed Voidage mi/m> Independent 31 33 35 Pellet diameter m ‘ont ‘ota7_— “ots Depth of hearth layer m 05, 10 18 Depthofareen pellets m 4 48 58 Total bed depth m Dependent 46 56 66 Gratespeed m/min 164 200-225 0 oor peo must rewrenarune ile (HAR) Fig Temperature profiles and spalling effect in the drying zones Fig 4—Caleulated parameters in the bed at various positions along the machine, The numbers refer to the windboxes Zone 10 the Preheat/Fiing Zone, the ‘steams to Windbox Recuperation Fens NO 4 and No 2, and the stream to the Hood Fecuperation Fan. ‘The airleeds required {o attain specified fan discharge tompor- ‘atures are also calculated, From this information, the tempering air requirements for the drying zones can be calculated together with the fuel and atomising ai flows in 2ll other parts of the machine. With these new gas compositions, the bed calculations are repeated and the ‘whole process reiterated until a satisfac- tory convergence occurs. Such physical limitations a8 the impossibility of negative air-bleeds are imposed, ‘Some second order effects or for in the model, These include above and below the bed together with hood sealing air requirements, heat losses from all ductwork, and by-passing fof gases from the Updraught Drying Zone to the first Down-draught Drying ‘THE CHEMICAL ENGINEER, SEPTEMBER 1977 Zone and from the fist Cooling Zone to the last few windboxes of the Firing Zone. Simulation Results ‘The Tablelists the base state andtherange ‘of the variables investigated. This sot of Simulations was performed at a constant tonnage which forces two of the six variables to be dependent, the other four being independent. The main invest- gations have been to vary the bed Porosity, the poet diameter, and. the heights of the hearth layer and the green pellets Figure 4, summarising a portion of the ‘output, shows how selected gas proper- fies’ vary down through the bed at various. windbox positions along. the ‘machine forthe base state Results for the drying section are shown in Fig 6 and for the overall plant economics in Fig 6. The abrasion index is 6st