First, using a certain proportion of DRI in the smelting process of high-quality steel in EAF can improve the mechanical properties and overall quality of high-quality steel. At the same time, reasonable control of the application proportion of DRI can achieve the purpose of energy saving and increase in production, which is of great significance to improving the comprehensive benefits of EAF steelmaking. Second, the application of DRI in BF steelmaking can reduce the coke ratio of BF steelmaking and increase the output of BF steelmaking. The economic benefits of BF steelmaking are greatly improved.

Directly reduced iron added to the electric arc furnace proportion varies, if the proportion of direct reduction of iron is less than 30%, can be used cans of material loading. The bottom of the basket is filled with light scrap, followed by heavy scrap and direct-reduced iron, to avoid too much lumping of direct-reduced iron. However, when the arc heats the thicker layers of direct reduced iron, the molten metal fills the spaces between the direct reduced iron and condenses, causing the charge to sinter into a single piece, making it difficult to add the charge as a whole to the molten pool and extending the melting cycle. When more than 30% of the charge is added in batches, due to the slow heat transfer of the direct-reduced iron, the relevant technical indicators are poor, and should be fed into the furnace by means of continuous charging.

Under the background of the rapid development of the world's iron and steel technology, the pace of innovative technology methods is also accelerating, as a kind of efficient blast furnace steelmaking technology, direct reduction iron technology effectively improves the quality of iron and steel products. The article proposes four direct reduction iron production technologies.

Based on the conditions in these aggregates, a test series to experimentally simulate the first few seconds after charging DRI was defined. DRI samples with different carbon contents and hot briquetted iron (HBI) were immersed in high- and low-carbon melts as well as high- and low-iron oxide slags. The reacted samples were quenched in liquid nitrogen. The specimens were qualitatively evaluated by investigating their surfaces and cross sections.

Since the European Union defined ambitious CO2 emission targets, low-carbon-emission alternatives to the widespread integrated blast furnace (BF)—basic oxygen furnace (BOF) steelmaking strategy—are demanded. Direct reduction (DR) with natural gas as the reducing agent, already an industrially applied technology, is such an alternative. Consequently, the melting behavior of its intermediate product, i.e., direct reduced iron (DRI), in either an electric arc furnace (EAF) or a submerged arc furnace (SAF), is of great interest. Based on the conditions in these aggregates, a test series to experimentally simulate the first few seconds after charging DRI was defined.

Four cases were compared: carbon-free and carbon-containing DRI from DR-grade pellets as well as fines from a fluidized bed reactor were melted batch-wise. A slag layer’s influence was investigated using DRI from the BF-grade pellets and the continuous addition of slag-forming oxides. While carbon-free materials show a porous structure with gangue entrapments, the carburized DRI forms a dense regulus with the oxides collected on top. The test with slag-forming oxides demonstrates the mixing effect of the arc’s electromagnetic forces. The cross-section shows a steel melt framed by a slag layer. These experiments match the past work in that carburized DRI is preferable, and material feed to the hotspot is critical for the EAF operation.

Hydrogen-based direct reduction is a promising technology for CO2 lean steelmaking. The electric arc furnace is the most relevant aggregate for processing direct reduced iron (DRI). As DRI is usually added into the arc, the behavior in this area is of great interest. A laboratory-scale hydrogen plasma smelting reduction (HPSR) reactor was used to analyze that under inert conditions.