State of the Art in Steel Mill Dust Recycling

The Waelz technology still represents the main process for treating electric arc furnace dust (EAFD). Interesting developments within this process and some new approaches transform the product into a competitor for the primary metallurgical industry by producing high grade zinc from the Waelz oxide. Another progress constitutes the utilization of the slag, which turns the Waelz technology into a zero‐waste process. An outlook regarding the future role of low zinc‐containing EAFD from basic oxygen furnaces and an overview concerning the world‐wide generation of EAFD and possible future solutions are described as well. Steel mill dust recycling is a comparable young business which only started to become more interesting in the late eighties. Even though strong R&D activities have been found since then, the Waelz kiln process is still the dominating technology. However, there are some potential alternatives and also interesting innovations within the Waelz kiln process.