Birmingham Steel Selects New Praxair Steel-Making Technology.DANBURY, Conn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 30, 1998--Praxair, Inc., (NYSE NYSE See: New York Stock Exchange :PX) today announced it has licensed its Praxair Coherent Jet(TM) technology to Birmingham Steel Corp. (NYSE: BIR BIR British Institute of Radiology BIR Bureau of Internal Revenue BIR Bureau of International Recycling BIR Baculovirus IAP Repeat BIR Biomedical Imaging Resource BIR Bureau of Intelligence and Research (US State Department) ) for installation at Birmingham's six steel-making plants in the United States. Terms of the corporate agreement with Birmingham were not disclosed. The Praxair technology, which can save a typical steel mill about $1.2 million annually, is a new oxygen injection system using wall-mounted nozzles to deliver a laser-like jet of oxygen into the molten steel bath. Praxair Coherent Jet technology eliminates the need for conventional lance manipulators and provides energy-savings, safety, productivity and environmental benefits. It is currently installed at five steel mills in the U.S. and Mexico. Birmingham Steel operates electric arc furnace An electric arc furnace (EAF) is a furnace that heats charged material by means of an electric arc. Arc furnaces range in size from small units of approximately one ton capacity (used in foundries for producing cast iron products) up to about 400 ton units used for secondary steel mills ("mini mills") in Birmingham, Ala., Cartersville, Ga., Kankakee, Ill., Jackson, Miss., Memphis, Tenn., and Seattle. Praxair supplies oxygen and other industrial gases to five of Birmingham's facilities (except Alabama) via cryogenic air separation plants and non-cryogenic vacuum pressure swing adsorption Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) is a technology used to separate some gas species from a mixture of gases under pressure according to the species' molecular characteristics and affinity for an adsorbent material. (VPSA VPSA Vice President for Student Affairs VPSA Vainshtein-Presnyakov-Sobelman Approximation ) oxygen-generating plants. The Praxair technology will be installed first at Birmingham's plant in Seattle in mid-1998. Birmingham Steel specializes in producing steel reinforcing bar, merchant products and special bar quality (SBQ SBQ Sociedade Brasileira de Quimica (Portugese) SBQ Special Bar Quality ) bar, rod and wire. Praxair is the largest industrial gases company in North and South America, and one of the largest worldwide, with 1997 sales of $4.7 billion. The company is a leading supplier of industrial gases and application technologies used by manufacturers of steel, aluminum, copper and other primary metals, with 1997 sales to this segment of more than $790 million. Praxair has received over 275 patents for steel-making technologies using industrial gases in innovative, money-saving ways, including technologies for burners, ladles, melting, refining, and reheating Reheating The addition of heat to steam of reduced pressure after the steam has given up some of its energy by expansion through the high-pressure stages of a turbine. . For more information, visit Praxair on the Internet at www.praxair.com. CONTACT: Media Relations Eric Jones, 203/837-2705 eric_jones@praxair.com or Investor Relations Joe Cappello, 203/837-2073 joe_cappello@praxair.com |
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