Energy-efficient production of a ferritic hot-rolled strip in an integrated casting-rolling plant

A process for producing a ferritic hot-rolled strip in an integrated casting-rolling plant, comprising:

• continuous casting of a liquid steel to give a strand having a slab or thin slab cross section in a continuous casting plant;
• prerolling of the strand to give an intermediate strip in a multistand roughing mill;
• increasing an average temperature of the intermediate strip using a plurality of inductive volume-heating modules in an induction furnace;
• heating of broad sides of the intermediate strip by at least one inductive surface heating module to a surface temperature of ≥1000° C. without raising the average temperature of the intermediate strip above 990° C., wherein the at least one surface heating module is operated using an alternating current having a first frequency f1≥20 kHz;
• descaling of the broad sides of the heated intermediate strip in a descaling apparatus after the heating of the broad sides;
• rolling of the descaled intermediate strip to give the hot-rolled strip in a multistand finishing mill, where the descaled intermediate strip after descaling and without further cooling enters a first stand of the finishing mill with an average temperature of 775-900° C. and at least a last rolling pass in the finishing mill takes place in the ferritic temperature range of the steel;
• setting of the hot-rolled strip to coiler temperature;
• and
• winding-up of the hot-rolled strip in a coiler, wherein
• the average temperature of the intermediate strip before the descaling step is in the range 875° to 990° C.