12th International Rolling Conference Trieste, Italy

Interview

with Rolando Paolone, CEO Danieli & CTO Danieli

Group

After almost 10 years the International Rolling Conference returned to Italy, where Danieli is based and from which it started a global crusade to provide technology and machinery for steel and nonferrous metal producing.

So, it is not surprising that Danieli chose to be the primary sponsor of the Rolling-12 and to support us in sharing knowledge and perspectives on the rolling process and technologies.

And who would be better to discuss technology than Rolando Paolone, the CEO of Danieli and CTO of Danieli Group?

We interviewed Mr. Paolone at the Stazione Marittima in Trieste, where our conference was held, and here’s what he told us.

1. What prompted Danieli to sponsor the 12th International ROLLING Conference?

The Rolling conference is organized to draw attendees from around the world, to involve all stakeholders in the sector.

Also, the organizer of the event is AIM, the Italian Association of Metallurgy, and so it is a source of pride for Danieli to support this year’s edition of the conference.

2. What technologies and innovations did Danieli present during this conference?

This event is organized as a “vertical” discussion, in the sense that we are talking specifically about rolling, and therefore we have presented the audience with everything Danieli offers in the field of long and flat products rolling.

3. What are the conventional technologies in the rolling process, and what are the new trends that are conquering the market?

As regards long products, large amounts of rebars are produced across the world, and this is done by using conventional technologies, which means a rolling mill where billets are rolled after being reheated in a reheating furnace.

Compared to this technology, which has been used over the last decade and more, Danieli is proposing a new technology that is entirely innovative and, besides being excellent from the point of view of production costcompetitiveness, it is also very good with regard to green production.

We are talking, for example, about the MIDA endless casting-rolling process.

This is one of those technologies, let's say a rolling line, that may be defined as traditional b that, however, brings amazing advantages for productivity.

Also, the Q-ONE system, which you will surely have heard of recently, completes this line and therefore, let’s say turns the installation into a rolling mill complete with entry section.

The use of Q-ONE, from the point of view of emission reduction, absolutely improves the plant performance compared to a conventional rolling mill.

4. What are the main challenges in steel rolling now, and how can Danieli help plant operators to overcome these challenges?

Our customers feel the need to advance their products according to market requirements, and this is true for both long and flat products.

While the rebar product maintains its features that just need to conform to specific requirements, the steel section market is changing and there are different standards to follow: the European market differs from Asia or America, etc.

How do we help our customers as their needs evolve?

The great support we can provide today is digital predictability, which means digitalizing the steelmaking operations. Therefore, ‘virtual’ rolling, to simplify the process planning and anticipate shape characteristics in case of long products, or mechanical properties of flat products.

Basically, the steel sheet remains a steel sheet, but with different mechanical properties according to different applications.

5. What answers is Danieli providing to customers transitioning to sustainable rolling?

It’s necessary to guarantee profitability to our customers, and so we introduce them to the solutions that improve competitiveness, which ultimately means reducing production costs -especially production costs! - while maintaining a high level of profitability.

And if these technologies are also green, well, bingo! We’ve come full circle!

I’d say that, for various reasons, Danieli started many years ago to try to evolve towards precisely a reduction in production costs and today this evolution is considered an advantage in terms of sustainability, in the sense that consuming less resources and energy, also results in less emissions.

And so, this is an interesting subject to propose to our customers. Moreover, during this event, moving away a little from the verticality of the event itself, we have presented the Danieli green technologies and the green approach, a model for the steelmaking sector.

And I’d add that I saw here a very attentive audience who seemed very interested in the subjects we discussed.