Effect of mineralogy on the low temperature electrolysis of iron ore

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Iron has been a vital component of mankind's history throughout the ages, exemplified with the Iron Age being the third epoch of the three-age system (stone and bronze being the other two). During the IndustrialRevolution, the importance of iron increased dramatically. Currently, up to 98% of the mined iron is used asthe primary input in steel industry to make steel, as steel is required by many industries such as: constructionand heavy industries, shipbuilding, machinery and motor vehicle manufacturing, railway construction, bridgebuilding and engineering applications.The production of iron from its ores is through a series of mineral processing steps, including mineralogicalanalyses, followed by reduction to iron (and then steel production). The reduction process most commonlyutilises a blast furnace, which has some significant environmental drawbacks. A report by the European Unionstates that currently there are no technologically feasible and economically reasonable alternatives tocompletely replace coking coal in the production of steel from iron ore. Recently, however, the advancementof low temperature alkaline electrolysis has introduced an environmentally-friendly alternative. Thistechnology does not work to the same levels of efficiency for all iron ore concentrates; as such, this project willinvestigate the impact of mineralogy on the low-temperature alkaline electrolysis process, and aims atoptimisation for Canadian iron deposits.