Energy Balance and Quantification of Rest Energies at SSAB Oxelosund AB

Abstract: The iron and steel industry is an energy intensive energy that consumes vast quantities of fossil fuels as the primary source of energy due to the dependence on coal for steel making. Although the SSAB integrated iron and steel plant at Oxelosund generates electricity and district heat from the process gases, the overall efficiency of the system is a mere 58%. In order to meet future climate targets and energy prices, the iron and steel industry has to improve its energy and resource efficiency. Furthermore, an extensive energy balance for SSAB Oxelosund has not been conducted till date. This served as the main motivation for this project. This report forms the basis of such a study and also provides a near accurate picture of the energy balances at SSAB Oxelosund, encouraging future work in this domain. This report shows that there is lot of waste heat at present that can be utilized by SSAB if such a demand exists. A few improvements have been suggested to improve the overall efficiency, however major changes may not be profitable due to the fact that the steel industry is in a decline today and major process changes will not be a viable solution.