Sicon's EcoScan designed for shredded scrap

The use of shredded scrap in the steelmaking process has significant advantages, but a quality problem characterized by rising copper content within shredded scrap can make it difficult to use. Germany-based Sicon has developed what it calls a solution to improve the use of shredded scrap in the steel production process.

EcoScan Online, an online-based analyzer of shredded scrap chemical parameters and its bulk weight, allows for "an optimum input" amount of shredded scrap to improve the steel making process, Sicon says.

EcoScan can be combined with Sicon’s ScrapTuning, which cleans shredded scrap from impurities detected by the EcoScan. The combination of these steps can allow steel producers to not only monitor their input material but also to pretreat it to meet quality criteria, such as guaranteed copper content below 0.15 or 0.2 percent.

Sicon says pretreating material makes shredded scrap attractive for the production of long steel as an alternative to pig iron, DRI (direct reduced iron) or HBI (hot briquetted iron).

The online-based system can be included in an existing plant network and is described by Sicon as completely automated.