The XXIV IMPC (International Mineral Processing Congress)which took place in Beijing from September 23 to 28, 2008gave an opportunity to see the important development in IronOre processing worldwide, especially in China. This reviewpaper presents:A brief history of the IMPC Congresses as well as the scopeof this XXIV IMPC in Beijing;The development of the Iron Ore demand and supply of theChinese Iron and Steel Industry and the consequences on IronOre imports;The impressive expansion of the Iron Ore mining andprocessing in China.

The technical requirements applied for the scheme installedat ArcelorMittal Tubarão for automatic separation of theutility electrical systems are presented. The criteria adoptedfor the settings of the electrical protections that compose thephilosophy of the grid separation scheme are treated as well.Historical results and real cases are used to evaluate thesystem performance.

The MRS-100 system combines at the same time the simplicityof a linear sliding gate and the advantages of a round plate.This sliding gate is based on 3 innovating approaches: a slidinggate built around a refractory plate, a mechanism that avoids thecracking of plates and finally, an optimisation of the round platethrough a programmable sequential rotation at the ladle stand.This MRS-100 system leads to a safe use, an improvement of thetasks at the working station and a reduction of the user costs.

The principle of mass flow AGC of tandem cold mill as wellas advanced mass flow AGC are introduced and analyzed.Based on advanced mass flow AGC, the effect of laservelocimeters to jointly control strip's thickness is analyzed.On the basis of the advanced mass flow AGC systemof tandem cold mill in Baosteel, the characteristics andmerits of advanced mass flow AGC in application of laservelocimeters are analyzed in detail.

The paper presents the new Mo free duplex stainless steelUR2202 (EN 1.4062) developed to provide a cost effectivealternative to 304L (EN 1.4307), concrete, organic materialsor galvanized carbon steel in potable water systems, pulp &paper industry and construction applications. The reductionof Ni is balanced by a nitrogen addition in order to obtaina microstructure containing approximately 50% ferrite and50% austenite. Several industrial heats were produced with22Cr%, 2Ni% and 0.2N% as the typical composition. Thenew lean duplex grade UR2202 has better localized anduniform corrosion resistance and twice the yield strengththan 304L.

The equivalent fatigue approach is a method for transformingcomplicated loadings into simpler ones, equivalent in termsof damage, without information about the geometry of thestructure. It has been used for the design specifications ofmetallic structures, for the conditions of their tests trials, andfinally for the characterization of customers and markets.The case of the one input equivalent fatigue approach hasbeen thoroughly investigated at PSA. The current work treatsthe extension of the equivalent fatigue approach to the caseof multi-input loadings. Especially the aim of this paper isto develop Markov chain models for the equivalent fatigueloadings.