Refractory

The enorm­ous tem­per­at­ures re­quired to pro­duce steel cause tre­mend­ous stress to the ma­ter­i­als used in blast fur­naces and coke bat­ter­ies – and they run 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. That’s where refractory materials come in. They re­tain their strength at very high temperatures and ensure the safety and con­tinu­ous operation of facilities. So it’s no sur­prise that 70% of re­fract­ory materials are consumed by the steel industry.

KAEFER spe­cial­ises in min­im­ising disruption to steel plants, oil & gas facilities, cement factor­ies and power sta­tions by partially shut­ting down targeted areas of a fa­cil­ity while refractory ma­ter­i­als are ap­plied, re­paired and replaced. KAEFER uses in­nov­at­ive materials and pro­cesses to en­sure that refractory continues to per­form at its optimum, as any is­sues with linings could mean the com­plete stop­page of a facility.

In the steel in­dustry in par­tic­u­lar, this is not an op­tion, as a plant needs to be running at ex­treme tem­per­at­ures constantly. Globally, we have worked on several large-scale pro­jects where we used in­nov­at­ive technologies and processes to maintain and op­tim­ise coke bat­ter­ies. Using com­plex thermal con­trol, we switch off in­di­vidual bat­tery ovens, fit the ne­ces­sary refractory materials and bracing systems that hold them and move on to the next one. This en­sures the constant op­er­a­tion of the fa­cil­ity.

KAEFER is one of the few com­pan­ies in the world that can do this and our expertise can ex­tend the life of cer­tain components by 10-15 years. All the while en­sur­ing that your busi­ness keeps moving dur­ing the process.