“Resolutely winning the battle of defending the blue sky is the most important thing”. “Return the blue sky, white clouds and twinkling stars to people”. “Return clear water, green shore and the scene that fishes swim in shallow water to people”... At the National Eco-environmental Protection Conference held from May 18 to May 19, General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that a good ecological environment is the most universal for the well-being of people's livelihood. They will adhere to benefiting the people through ecological environment, mainly solve prominent environmental problems that damage people’s health and continue meeting the people’s growing needs for beautiful ecological environment. General Secretary Xi’s entrustment is the belief that Shougang Co., Ltd. always adheres to, namely shouldering the green development mission with the steel backbone.

Inherit genes and build a green home

After going west more than 10 kilometers along Chang’an Avenue from Tian’anmen Square, we can reach Shougang. In Beijing, the capital, Shougang’s environmental protection and greening are always at the forefront of the industry and the times.

Early in 1978, Shougang had proposed the establishment of “parks” as a corporate objective with the plant office and the greening team set up. In 1983, Shougang was among the first batch of advanced enterprises of national greening, and it has been rated as the national and Beijing advanced green enterprise for more than 20 consecutive years. Shougang is in the first place in many aspects in the field of environmental protection and circular economy in China.

As the platform management enterprise of Shougang’s iron and steel industry and the only listed enterprise in China, Shougang Co., Ltd. has been sticking to the excellent traditions of Shougang’s green environmental protection. In the relocation and adjustment of Shougang’s iron and steel industry, it proposes that “relocation and adjustment is not a copy, but a thorough upgrade.”

Shougang Qian’an Iron & Steel Co., Ltd. is the forerunner of Shougang’s relocation and adjustment. It adheres to the construction orientation “high level, high starting point and high standards” and the construction concept “simple process, large-scale equipment, high-end products, clean environment and digital information”, aiming at the development goals “first-class products, first-class technology, first-class environment and first-class benefits” and strives to create a new generation of metallurgical demonstration enterprises that are of “circular economy, energy conservation and environment protection, cleanness and high efficiency”.

Today, Shougang Co., Ltd. has become a shining pearl in eastern Hebei and a green continent at the foot of the southern Yan Mountains. The plant now has 70 kinds of more than 20,000 trees and 110 kinds of more than 1 million flowering shrubs. It has achieved a green coverage rate of 30% in the plant, created a good environment with “simple but excellent” greening quality and effect and successively won the honors such as Tangshan scientific development demonstration enterprise, “Hebei Garden-style Enterprise”, “Hebei Garden Green High-quality Project”, “National Advanced Green Enterprise in Metallurgical Industry” and “National Green Model Enterprise”.

Perfectly control and adhere to green manufacturing

Realizing greening and environmental protection in the whole production process is the persistent pursuit of Shougang Co., Ltd. The production process of Shougang Co., Ltd. is equipped with 123 sets of dust removal and purification facilities, with a total design air volume of 44.79 million m3/h. Blast furnace gas adopts fully dry dust removal technology and is equipped with a spray washing tower to eliminate harmful components and achieve comprehensive purification. In China, it is the first enterprise that adopts wet electrostatic dust removal technology to achieve deep purification of flue gas with three converters in No. 1 steelmaking. The purification of flue gas with two converters in No. 2 steelmaking adopts Voestalpine and Lurgi’s LT dry dust removal technology, so it runs efficiently and has a stable effect. Shougang Co., Ltd. ensures the high efficiency, low consumption and environmental friendliness in the production process with high-end equipment, advanced technology and high investment in environmental protection.

In order to reduce energy consumption and improve the level of comprehensive energy management and control, Shougang Co., Ltd. actively prepared to establish an energy management and control center, which was completed and put into operation in June 2013. After meticulous preparations, all indicators have reached their expected goals, and the integrated management of wind, water, electricity and gas has been achieved. The self-provided power station adopts the most advanced excess heat and pressure recycle and CCPP power generation technologies in the current steel industry and builds a blast furnace TRT and saturated vapor excess heat and pressure generator unit. Since 2013, all units have been operating stably, and its self-generation rate has remained above 60%. In 2017, the self-generated capacity was 2.4 billion KW·h, ranking the leading level in China. The recycling of gas is also a key task of “green manufacturing and energy conservation” of Shougang Co., Ltd. As low-grade and highly toxic fuel, the recycling of blast furnace gas is always a problem in the industry. By comprehensively analyzing the structure of gas resources and expanding the dust removal facilities for blast furnace gas, in 2011, it independently invented a zero-emission system for blast furnace gas and obtained a national patent, achieving zero emission and being the frontrunner among domestic peers. After the system is put into operation, it will reduce nearly 50,000 cubic meters of gas loss per hour and generates more 18,000 KW·h of electricity, achieving good environmental and economic benefits.

Water is the source of life and is also the blood of the iron and steel companies. It is also the focus of Shougang Co., Ltd. By adopting advanced water resource cascade utilization technology to control processes’ water consumption, it has successively invested in the construction of two integrated sewage treatment plants to achieve full-process sewage treatment. Based on this, international advanced membrane treatment and reverse osmosis technology are adopted to build a deep recycled desalinization station with independent intellectual property. The quality of desalinated water meets the requirements of the high-temperature cooling system in each process and greatly improves the utilization rate of water circulation. In 2007, the utilization rate of water cycle is as high as 98.5%, and tons of steel consume 2.90 tons of new water, which is at the leading level in China.

In terms of process control, Shougang Co., Ltd. has established an environmental monitoring system consisting of two parts: automatic monitoring and manual monitoring. The automatic monitoring system is divided into automatic monitoring of air environmental quality and exhaust gas pollution sources, on-line automatic monitoring of sewage water, automatic monitoring of noises in the plant, video monitoring system and on-line monitoring and management platform of exhaust gas pollution sources. All automatic monitoring data are uploaded to the environmental management platform in real time. Shougang Co., Ltd. pays great attention to the construction of the management system. It establishes a relatively complete environmental protection management system, confirms the environmental protection management responsibilities and professional division of labor for departments at all levels and clarifies the work responsibilities to all employees. Each department is equipped with full-time and part-time management personnel of environmental protection to roundly promote the systematic construction of environmental protection management of the Company and continuously strengthen the foundation of environmental management.