Open AccessWater-Assisted Green Production of Steel Powder in Molten Salt
Author(s) -
Kaiyu Xie,
Ali Reza Kamali
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
journal of the electrochemical society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.258
H-Index - 271
eISSN - 1945-7111
pISSN - 0013-4651
DOI - 10.1149/1945-7111/abdef1
Subject(s) - molten salt , materials science , hydrogen production , metallurgy , cathode , alloy , non blocking i/o , electrolyte , chemical engineering , hydrogen , electrochemistry , anode , electrode , chemistry , catalysis , organic chemistry , engineering , biochemistry
We report on the production of hydrogen in molten salt and its in situ utilization for the reduction of ball-milled Fe 2 O 3 –Cr 2 O 3 –NiO mixed oxides. In this process, the mixed oxides in the form of powders are directly reduced by the hydrogen electro-generated in molten LiCl through the galvanostatic polarization of an iron cathode immersed in the melt at 670 °C, providing an order of magnitude higher extraction rate than those of conventional electrolytic technologies. The reduced powder has a nanostructured morphology consisted of Ni- and Cr-rich Fe nanocrystals, with no detectable intermediate phase. This processing approach is substantially less complicated and more sustainable in comparison with the available methods for scalable production of alloy powders.