Funded by the European Union’s LIFE programme, the 5RefrACT project (SYSTEMATIC AND INTEGRAL VALORIZATION OF REFRACTORIES UNDER THE “5R” APPROACH), led by SIDENOR, was launched on July 1st.
The 5RefrACT project mainly aims at extending the “4R” paradigm up to “5R” (reduce – reuse – remanufacture – recycle – re-educate) and applying it to the steel sector and the refractory market, thus achieving an integral valorization of these materials.
For this purpose, three main actions shall be implemented simultaneously:
· Increasing the recovery of refractories to up to 80% on the recoverable fraction by means of strategies for the recovery of used refractories.
· Developing new high added value refractory materials, with up to 70% of additionally recovered refractories.
· Reduce the occupation and contamination of soils by avoiding the landfilling of up to 3,600 tonnes of waste.
The LIFE 5RefrACT project will be the first systematic approach, at industrial level, to refractory management in the steel sector. The consortium of the project is made up by 6 members, among which are companies, technology centres and universities, and is supported by institutions such as UNESID, the European steel technology platform ESTEP, the SPIRE cluster and IHOBE. The total budget of the project amounts to €1,675,395, including a contribution of the LIFE programme amounting to €1,005,234. The project has an implementation deadline of 27 months and is expected to be completed by September 2020.