Alleima’s division Kanthal has signed a strategic partnership with Danieli, a major global supplier of turnkey plants and equipment for the iron- and steel industry, to jointly develop and scale up Kanthal’s demonstrated electric process gas direct-heating solution, Prothal® DH, to full industrial scale. The introduction of Prothal® DH technology in blast furnace operation will reduce CO2 emissions in ironmaking.
Under the name Prothal® DH, Kanthal has developed a direct heated electric solution for high-temperature process gas heating – one important step towards enabling zero-emission DRI plants. The solution has been tested and verified in pilot scale and with this partnership, Kanthal and Danieli aims to further develop this technology to full scale, which means up to 100’s of megawatts.
The ambition is to have a solution ready for commercialization in 2027, and once Prothal® DH has been installed in Energiron hydrogen-ready DRI plants, fully green DRI production will be achieved. The heating solution will be developed for hydrogen, natural gas and combinations, thereby enabling retrofitting of existing DRI plants.
Energiron is DRI technology jointly developed by Tenova and Danieli.
“We are progressing further in bringing large-scale electric gas heaters to the market, a crucial move to significantly cut or even eliminate CO2 emissions. We're thrilled to collaborate with a leading expert in DRI technology to enable the steel industry's transition to greener practices,” says Robert Stål, President at Kanthal.
“Even for natural gas based DRI plants, you will achieve more than 30% reduction of CO2 emissions when you electrify the heating system. This partnership allows the unlocking of huge potential for a new technology that will drive Energiron DR plants carbon footprint furtherly ahead in the race of green steel,” says Marco Lapasin, Vice President Danieli Engineering Centro Metallics.