At the construction site of the fifth ESP production line of RZGT Iron and Steel Holdings Group Co., Ltd., the reporter saw that the construction staff was nervously carrying out civil construction, and went all out to grab the construction period and grasp the progress.
“This is also the sixth ESP production line in the world, with a planned total investment of 2.2 billion yuan. One third of the investment has been completed. The planned annual production capacity of the project is 1.71 million tons.” The relevant person in charge of Japan Steel told reporters.
ESP, or Endless strip production, means “all-headless strip production”, and is known as the “third steel industry technology revolution” after converter steelmaking and continuous steel casting, and represents the world ’s hot-rolled strip technology. The highest level. From molten steel to coil, the traditional hot-rolled production line is more than 1,000 meters long and the process takes 3 hours, while the current ESP production line is only 180 meters and the process only takes 7 minutes, which saves at least 50% of energy, 70% of water, and Two-thirds of the ground, and the thickness of steel coils below 1.2 mm, only ESP can achieve stable batch production.
“It’s like putting flour and water and then coming out of the dough directly. You can’t see the process of noodles and noodles.” Yu Yao, the head of the ESP manufacturing department of the Japan Steel Group, gave a reporter an image.
The reduction in the number of processes does not mean that the product quality has become lower. On the contrary, the ESP production line has produced “thinner and stronger strips”. The reporter learned that the first to third ESP production lines rolled 0.8mm ultra-thin hot-rolled steel coils in batches, and the fourth production line has been down to 0.6mm, which is equivalent to “the thickness of four or five sheets of A4 paper.” , More than half thinner than other companies’ products. After the fifth ESP production line is put into operation, it is expected to achieve 0.6 mm batch rolling and 0.5 mm test rolling. Most importantly, because the thickness of cold rolling can be reached after hot rolling, the product replaces some of the cold rolled products, and can be directly used after pickling and galvanizing.
In the Baohua New Material production workshop with bright blue as the main color, the six supporting production lines are still increasing the added value of ESP products. “If the ESP hot-rolled steel coil is the dough just rolled out, then the role of leveling and straightening is to process the dough more evenly.” Refers to the continuous leveling and straightening production line behind it, the vice director of the cold-rolled sheet manufacturing department of the Nissho Group Minister Li Yuanxu followed the analogy of Yu Yao.
“Thinner and stronger strip steel” meets the needs of “lightweight” in downstream industries such as automobiles and construction. According to estimates, compared with conventional automobile steel, ESP high-strength automobile steel can achieve a weight reduction of 15%. Based on the annual sales of 29 million cars, it can save 6.52 million tons of steel and reduce costs by 29.34 billion yuan. . “It is also a great benefit for the general public. The cost of materials for automobiles and electric vehicles has been reduced, and consumers can spend less money to buy their favorite travel tools.” Yu Yao said.
Due to high technology content, high added value, and excellent quality, ESP products are widely used in high-end industries such as food packaging, automotive panels, and container panels, which have strong competitiveness and great potential. It is understood that there are five ESP production lines in the world that have been put into production. Nippon Steel Group owns only four and has achieved 0.8 mm strip rolling. The ESP production line under construction will develop in the direction of ultra-thin specifications. It is expected to have a rolling capacity of 0.6 mm and a trial rolling capacity of 0.5 mm after production, filling the gap of domestic ultra-thin hot-rolled strip high-strength steel.
ESP products, which account for half of the RZGT Steel Group, have brought rich returns to the RZGT Steel Group. From January to October of last year, the output value of Japan Steel Group was 80.51 billion yuan, an increase of 44.1% year-on-year; 2.64 million tons of deep-processed pickled products and 1.016 million tons of galvanized products, a total of 3.656 million tons, an increase of 15.5% year-on-year; the output value was 13.12 billion yuan, A year-on-year increase of 5.12%.