3. General comments and conclusions

The first important point to emphasize is that the EOF process works very efficiently at the Pains plant, demonstrating that it is possible to work with various proportions of cast iron and scrap: this is a major attraction of the process and explains why, after a number of setbacks, new plants are being built in Asia. As the table 1 clearly shows, these are mainly mini-mills with EOF reactors of around 30 to 40 t and capacities of 250,000 to 600,000 t/year.

The recommissioning of the AFS plant in Trieste shows - and this will be our second conclusion - that larger EOF units, of at least 650,000 t/year with a 70 t reactor, can now be envisaged without great risk.

It seems that...