Calcined colemanite as an additive for iron ore sintering process

During sintering process, iron ores, fluxes and coke are agglomerated into a desirable blast furnace feed. The degrading iron ore quality and environmental norms has forced sinter producers to look for additives which can improve the sintering process efficiency. For the current work, use of calcined colemanite as an additive was studied by adding it from 0% to 4% within the sinter raw blend through lab-scale pot trials. During the sintering process, calcined colemanite forms a Calcium Borosilicate (Ca₁₁B₂Si₄O₂₂) phase at temperature above 400 °C which latter gets dissociated within the liquid melt thus increasing the liquid slag formation. Increasing calcined colemanite up to 2% increases tumbler index from 56.27% to 61.67%, decreasing thereafter to 55.33% at 4% of calcined colemanite. The sinter yield (+5 mm) is also found to be maximum of 89.39% at 2% of calcined colemanite. An increase in calcined colemanite from 0% to 4% increases sintering time from 20 to 26 min, decreasing the overall sinter productivity from 2.35 to 1.99 t/m²/h. Before integrating calcined colemanite within the sintering process at plant scale, its cost and efficacy must be considered. An alternate approach can be combining it with an organic binder where the two can complement each other in providing the required sinter properties.