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.

The 72nd annual meeting of the ICCP (International Committee for Coal and Organic Petrology) was held on September 19-24, 2021 in Prague, as part of which a Symposium entitled: ‘Future of Coal and Organic Petrology in the Era of Transition from Fossil to Renewable Fuels” was organized . The meeting was organized by the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague, Masaryk University in Brno, Charles University in Prague. The meeting and the symposium was attended by researchers from all over the world, including: Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Spain, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Greece, Serbia, Romania, Portugal, USA, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, India, Australia, South Africa.

As a representative of Institute for Chemical Processing of Coal Dr. Małgorzata Wojtaszek-Kalaitzidi attended and presented, inter alia, poster entitled: The influence of biochar addition to coking blend on coke structure and quality by: M. Wojtaszek-Kalaitzidi, M. Rejdak, G. Gałko, B. Mertas. The poster contained preliminary results of pyrolysis tests of various types of biomass performed as part of the BioCoke4FAI – Bio-Coke for Ferroalloys Industry Production project.

Presentation of the BioCoke4FAI project at the “Project Kick-off Conference” organized by the NCBR.On June 14-15, two events were organized by the National Center for Research and Development related to the implementation of projects under the “Applied Research” program, EEA and Norway Grants. On the first day, the on-line event “Project Kick-off Conference” took place, during which, within 7 thematic sessions, there were presentations of projects from the current edition of the above-mentioned program. As part of the conference, the BioCoke4FAI project – Bio-coke for ferroalloys industry production was presented The BioCoke4FAI project is implemented jointly with the SINTEF Institute (Norway) and industrial partners from Norway – Eramet and Poland – Koksownia Częstochowa Nowa. IChPW acts as the Project Promoter. Our Norwegian partners also took part in the session. The aim of the project is to develop an innovative and economically viable technology for the production of bio-coke for the production of ferroalloys used in the metallurgical industry. On the second day “Workshops for Project Promoters” took place, in which participated, inter alia, IChPW employees involved in the project. The workshop was attended by 150 people from both Poland and Norway.

The implementation of the project entitled “Bio-coke for ferroalloys industry production” with the acronym BioCoke4FAI, which received funding in the POLNOR 2019 competition announced by the National Centre for Research and Development under the Norwegian Financial Mechanism 2014-2021, has been launched. The project funding agreement was signed on 20 October 2020 in Warsaw.
The aim of the BioCoke4FAI project is to develop an innovative and economically viable bio-coke production technology for the ferroalloy industry. The project will be implemented from 01/01/2021 to 31/12/2023 by the Polish-Norwegian Consortium represented by:

o INSTITUTE FOR CHEMICAL PROCESSING OF COAL – Project Promoter (Poland)
o SINTEF AS – research partner (Norway)
o KOKSOWNIA CZĘSTOCHOWA NOWA SP. Z O.O. – industrial partner (Poland)
o ERAMET NORWAY – industrial partner (Norway)

The total cost of project implementation: 6 792 278.00 PLN with the amount of co-financing:
6 275 990.46 PLN

On 25 January 2021 the kick-off meeting of BioCoke4FAI project – Bio-coke for ferroalloys industry production was held. The purpose of the project is to develop innovative and economically viable technology for the production of bio-coke for ferroalloys used in the metallurgical industry. The meeting was organized by the Institute for Chemical Processing of Coal (ICHPW) – Project Promoter. The project is implemented by a Polish-Norwegian consortium: ICHPW (Poland, Project Promoter), SINTEF (Norway, Scientific Partner), ERAMET (Norway, Industrial Partner – ferroalloys producer) and KCN – Koksownia Częstochowa Nowa (Poland, Industrial Partner – coke producer).
Due to the current Covid-19 pandemic, the kick-off meeting was held online by MS Teams software. The meeting was divided into three parts. In the first part, all partners presented the scope of activities of their units. In the second part, the basic assumptions of the implemented project were discussed, the scope of R&D work and the role of individual partners in its implementation was discussed in details. In the third part, organizational issues related to the current implementation of the project were discussed. The main idea of this project is to produce a hybrid reductant based on coal-biomass blends (replacement of non-renewable fossil elemental carbon forming the structure of coke with carbon from renewable sources – biomass) and verification of its usability in a pilot scale.