Investigations on the nature of pollution created by secondary re-rolling mills

In the recent past substantial attention has been paid to the pollution caused by various metallurgical industries in the small and medium scale sector with foundries receiving even greater attention. Over the past three years the present authors have carried out detailed investigations on the nature and quantum of pollution created by the metallurgical industries in this sector and have come out with a cost effective design for the control of suspended particulate matters emitted from the cupola exit gases in the foundries. It was also appreciated during this study that the secondary re-rolling mills also create substantial pollution especially in the work area around the coal fired reheating furnaces. Since in the small and medium scale sector most of these reheating furnaces are fired by coal, their contribution towards degrading the environment is substantial. The present paper highlights some of these findings and suggests a few remedial measures through improvement in the furnace design or optimization of reheating furnace operation. The results of switching over to oil (LDO) fired reheating furnace have also been discussed.