Blast furnace operating method

Abstract

A blast furnace operating method smoothly starts up a blast furnace with a short shutdown period, thereby solving the problem with the conventional blast furnace banking technique where a long shutdown period was required. The method restarts blasting after blast stoppage including reducing the height of a raw material charge layer surface that is immediately above tuyeres of a blast furnace to a height lower than an upper end of a bosh zone of the blast furnace and then stopping blasting, in which an oxygen-containing gas is blown from a tap hole into the blast furnace after stopping blasting of the blast furnace, thereby burning coke remaining between the tuyeres and the tap hole to reduce the volume of residues inside the blast furnace; coke is newly charged into a volume-reduced area thus formed; and blasting is restated by opening the tuyeres positioned above the tap hole.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.