The dross produced in the process of melting scrap iron in the “Makstil” smelter in Skopje, North Macedonia, will be used as material for subbases of new roads and streets and as partial substitute for cement in the production of concrete blocks.
This innovation which was presented in the industrial complex “Makstil” yesterday to Fatmir Bytyqi, the Deputy Prime minister for economic affairs of North Macedonia, and to Naser Nuredini, the minister of the environment, has been developed in the Cinderela Project, which is implemented in seven countries, with 13 partnering companies from Europe, one of which is the Civil Engineering Institute “Macedonia” from Skopje.
The project’s goal is to use the dross from the melting furnaces as a building material, thus decreasing urban waste. It’s a new business model of circular economy, which is the only sustainable option for the development of mankind’s future and for saving the planet.
According to Deputy Prime Minister Bytyqi, the circular economy has great potential in this country, especially in the areas of energetics and agriculture.
“Circular economy is one of the ways to maximize the use of the available and limited natural resources and to provide sustainable economic growth and development, and at the same time to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions. I’m happy that today the private sector has finally started to actively talk about the circular economy, but I regret that we as a country are maybe 10 years late,” Bytyqi said.
The building material that was prepared from the slag has already been used by “Makstil” for the reconstruction of a street of 2,100 square meters and a parking lot of 6,500 square meters.
This material, as the Director of the Hydrology Institute, Zlatko Ilioski informed, has passed all the stages of development, research and use.
“The project Cinderela established three pilot plants, in Spain, Slovenia, and in “Makstil”. White and black dross, which are waste products of the scrap iron smelting, were used. The black dross was used for creating asphalt mixes and the white dross was added to the cement used for manufacture of concrete blocks,” Ilioski said.
The laboratory analyses were conducted by the Civil Engineering Institute and they proved that the waste material can be safely used in the construction industry, thus providing new use value as a permanent product. The environmental performance of the product was examined by the University “Goce Delchev” and a number of laboratories in Europe. It showed that the black dross is an inert material and its use does not generate influences on the environment.
