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Steel is an alloy composed of between 0.2 and 2.0 percent carbon, with the balance being iron. From prehistory through the creation of the blast furnace, iron was produced from iron ore as wrought iron, 99.82–100 percent Fe, and the process of making steel involved adding carbon to iron, usually in a serendipitous manner, in the forge, or via the cementation process.
One of the fragments was made of bloomery iron rather than meteoritic iron. [37] [38] The earliest iron artifacts made from bloomeries in China date to end of the 9th century BC. [39] Cast iron was used in ancient China for warfare, agriculture and architecture. [9] Around 500 BC, metalworkers in the southern state of Wu achieved a temperature ...
In 1945, the US produced 67% of the world's pig iron, and 72% of the steel. By comparison, 2014 percentages were 2.4% of the pig iron, and 5.3% of the steel production. Although US iron and steel output continued to grow overall through the 1950s and 1960s, the world steel industry grew much faster, and the US share of world production shrank.
The industry produced over 74 million net tons per year as of November 2024. [1] Most iron and steel in the United States is now made from iron and steel scrap, rather than iron ore. The United States is also a major importer of iron and steel, as well as iron and steel products.
Direct-reduced iron can be produced from iron ore as it reacts with atomic hydrogen. Renewable hydrogen allows steelmaking without fossil fuels. Direct reduction occurs at 1,500 °F (820 °C). The iron is infused with carbon (from coal) in an electric arc furnace. Hydrogen electrolysis requires approximately 2600 kWh per ton of steel. Hydrogen ...
The Bessemer process was the first inexpensive industrial process for the mass production of steel from molten pig iron before the development of the open hearth furnace. The key principle is removal of impurities from the iron by oxidation with air being blown through the molten iron. The oxidation also raises the temperature of the iron mass ...
Steel (with smaller carbon content than pig iron but more than wrought iron) was first produced in antiquity by using a bloomery. Blacksmiths in Luristan in western Persia were making good steel by 1000 BC. [92] Then improved versions, Wootz steel by India and Damascus steel were developed around 300 BC and AD 500 respectively. These methods ...
Pig iron, also known as crude iron, is an intermediate good used by the iron industry in the production of steel. It is developed by smelting iron ore in a blast furnace . Pig iron has a high carbon content, typically 3.8–4.7%, [ 1 ] along with silica and other dross , which makes it brittle and not useful directly as a material except for ...