Comment on Anon questions our energy sector
barsoap@lemm.ee 9 hours agoWhat makes iron is the lack of O in Fe~3~O~4~ (that’s magnetite, other ores are similar). Carbon for alloying is not an issue it can be easily covered by biomass, you smelt the magnetite by combining it with hydrogen resulting in iron and (very hot) water, no carbon involved, then you add carbon, something like 2% thereabouts, to get steel. Add too much and you get cast iron. The overwhelming majority of coke used in the coke process is not used for alloying, but smelting and reducing the iron. That part of the steel making process is completely decarbonised, and the carbon that’s used in alloying, well, it’s not in the atmosphere is it.
You can rip the oxygen off iron with electricity but that’s less energy-efficient than taking a detour via electrolysis. It’s different with aluminium, there using electricity directly is more efficient.
Sad to day I now understand your point of view. Natural gas wins.
If you think that’s what I’m saying then no, you don’t understand my POV.
iii@mander.xyz 8 hours ago
Vs
barsoap@lemm.ee 8 hours ago
OMG yes I said “blast furnace to reduce steel”. I meant “to reduce iron [to produce steel]”. Obviously: What else would you use hydrogen for in a blast furnace?
But “reduce steel” is still actually correct for recycling steel: Scrap has rust on it so it also needs to be reduced. Which you would’ve realised instead of trying to turn this into a silly gotcha if you knew what you were talking about.