From 1 to 3 June, IChPW employees Michał Rejdak and Małgorzata Wojtaszek – Kalaitzidi took a study visit as part of the BioCoke4FAI project. The study visit took place at the Norwegian research Institute SINTEF in Trondheim, which is also the research partner of the project. The visit was supervised by Michał Książek from SINTEF. As part of the visit, IChPW employees participated in technological research of bio-coke produced at the Institute. The research included parameters important for the production of manganese ferroalloys, such as electrical resistance, reactivity to CO / CO2 gas (SINTEF method), studies of the microstructure of biocokes by EPMA (electron microscopy) and slag reactivity.

On May 30 and 31, the third BioCoke4FAI project meeting took place. The meeting was held on-site at SINTEF in Trondheim, Norway. The project is implemented under the POLNOR 2019 program by the Polish-Norwegian consortium: IChPW (Poland, Project Promoter), SINTEF (Norway, research partner), ERAMET (Norway, industrial partner, ferroalloys producer) and KCN, Koksownia Częstochowa Nowa (Poland, industrial partner – coke producer). All representatives of the project partners participated in the meeting. The meeting was divided into three parts. In the first part, all partners presented the results of their research work. In the second part, the work planned to be carried out in the further part of the project was discussed, taking into account the results obtained so far. Organizational matters of the project were also discussed. During the third part, participants could visit the research infrastructure of the SINTEF and NTNU laboratories.

On November 29 and 30, the second BioCoke4FAI project meeting took place. The meeting took place in Zabrze at the seat of the Institute for Chemical Processing of Coal – the project promoter. In addition to the employees of the Institute, the meeting was attended by representatives of all partners co-implementing the project, i.e. the SINTEF Institute from Norway, the ERAMET company from Norway and the Częstochowa Nowa Coking Plant. The aim of the meeting was to present and discuss the project results obtained so far, discuss current issues related to its implementation as well as plan future activities. As part of the meeting, the participants also made a technological visit to the Częstochowa Nowa Coking Plant, where they could learn in detail about the technological system of coke production with use of stamp-charged technology.

On November 10 and 11, the 37th International Cokemaking Conference was held. The conference took place in Ostrava in the Czech Republic, and was attended by over 100 representatives of several dozen companies related to the cokemaking industry and research companies from various European countries. At the conference, a poster was presented: The influence of charcoal addition to coking blend on quality parameters of produced bio-coke. The poster shows the current results of the assessment of the charcoal addition (to the coking blend) on the quality parameters of produced bio-cokes. The tests were carried out for the conditions of the gravity charged and stamp charged coke oven batteries. The obtained results are promising and met with the interest of the conference participants.

On October 21, the 5th Mineral Engineering Conference 2020/2021 was held. The conference was held on-line. At the conference, an employee of the Institute for Chemical Processing of Coal, Dr. Eng. Michał Rejdak gave a lecture presenting selected results of the project with the acronym BioCoke4FAI (Bio-coke for ferroalloys industry production), concerning the impact of the addition of commercially available charcoal on the mechanical strength of the compacted coal charge. This form of coal charge is used for the production of coke in coke oven batteries using the stamp-charging method. Therefore, from the point of view of industrial production of bio-coke based on coal-biomass blends, the assessment of the impact of the addition of bio-components on the strength parameters of the coal charge is very important.