Belgium – ArcelorMittal, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI), BHP and Mitsubishi Development have successfully launched the CO2 capture pilot plant at ArcelorMittal Ghent’s blast furnaces in Belgium. The plant is scheduled to run in Ghent for one to two years. During this period, the parties will test the feasibility of scaling up the technology.
The companies have been working on the construction and delivery of the plant at the site since January. In 2022, the companies agreed to test MHI’s CO2 capture technology at ArcelorMittal’s Ghent site for several years. Initially, the parties will deploy the unit to test its operation with blast furnace gas and reheating furnace gas. Thereafter, they will also test the unit with flue gases from, for example, a Direct Reduced Iron plant.
The test period at the Ghent site consists of two phases. In the first phase, the companies want to remove and capture 300 kg of CO2 per day from the waste gas from the blast furnaces. According to MHI, this is a major technical challenge because this “top gas” contains many different contaminants. In a second phase, the companies are investigating the separation and capture of CO2 in the waste gases from the reheating furnace of the hot rolling mill. A mixture of industrial gases is burned here. These include coke gas, blast furnace gases and natural gas.
Foto: MHI
