A blast furnace is where Iron is extracted from Iron ore. Three materials are used for the extraction progress. These three materials are coke (A pure form of coal), Iron ore and limestone. Each of these materials has a certain job. The actual blast furnace can be as high as 30m. The materials are poured in at the top then hot air is fed in to help the reaction progress. The iron is then poured into tornadoes and the slag, which is a waste material, is put into large outdoor pits. All blast furnaces are by the sea because it is easy to transport large quantities of material for the furnace.
Coke is a pure form of coal that is
created by heating it. The coke is brought in on trucks. Then it is poured into airless ovens and heated for sixteen hours. When the coke comes out the other side it sets alight. The trucks drive to a building. In which the coke is sprayed with cold water to put the fires out. It is then emptied into the furnace.
Coke Ovens
The heat from this process is then sent to another building to oxides it before it goes into the furnace. Why are these materials used? Well coke is added to help the reaction process and also to gain the oxygen from the oxidizes iron ore. Then the Limestone is used to mix with the rock from the iron ore. This mixture is called slag and is one of the waste products.
Once the iron ore has been reduced (Had the oxygen taken off it) and separated from the rock it then goes to the bottom of the furnace. The slag floats on top of the iron as its less dense.
During the process lots of waste products are created. The first one is heat in the ovens, which is added to oxygen and pumped into the furnace to help the reaction. The next one is hot gas from the reaction. These are taken up a pipe at the top of the furnace and are used to heat the ovens. The final waste product is slag. This is usually sold to companies as it can be used in road building and house building. But it can also be used to reclaim land from the sea.
