The Energiron control system is based on an architecture consisting of a traditional Level 1 system for equipment control with a Distributed Control System, plus a new Level 2, not only for process supervision, data tracking and creation of production reports but also process optimization. A “Process Reconstruction Model” (PRM) has been developed. It uses instrumentation signals coming from the PLC and physical equations in order to provide a full description of the plant status. In this way it is possible to calculate many normally unmeasurable items such as the top gas composition and relevant red/ox ratio.

Another target of this PRM is the Product Quality Prediction; starting from the gas composition measured by the mass spectrometer, we can predict with sufficient lead time (from 6 to 10 hours before the material is discharged) the characteristics of the product, such as metallization, carbon content and DRI temperature. As a consequence the process engineers have a consistent margin in terms of time to adjust the process parameters in order to reach the desired production both in terms of quality and quantity. Further innovative Level 2 functionalities based on the Extended Kalman Filter Estimator and the Linear Quadratic Gaussian Regulator for calculation of the optimal Level 1 set points as a function of the Level 2 requested inputs will drive the future development of the advanced DR Process control.