Chapter 10. Control of Iron and Steel Production Installations

“Cold rolling operation” means an installation that rolls steel that is not preheated.

“Continuous casting” means a method of pouring liquid steel into semifinished shapes.

“Good management practices” means operating and maintenance practices for controlling processes within design conditions and minimizing air pollution to the extent practicable with existing equipment.

“Hot dip coating” means a molten inorganic formulation used for coating on strip steel.

“Hot rolling operation” means an installation that rolls preheated steel.

Iron and Steel Production Installations.

“Opacity record” means the highest average of any 6 consecutive minutes of readings measured and calculated in the manner described in the Department's Technical Memorandum (TM) 91-01 Method 1004I.

“Tons of sinter produced” means the weight of sinter that is transferred to the blast furnace stockhouse during a calendar day.

“Venturi scrubber flow rate” means the water flow rate through the venturi scrubber.

“Venturi scrubber pressure drop” means the arithmetic difference between the static pressures of the gas stream at the inlet and the outlet of the venturi scrubber.

COMAR 26.11.06.12 (New Source Performance Standards);

COMAR 26.11.15.02 (National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants);

COMAR 26.11.17 Requirements for Major New Sources and Modifications; and

COMAR 26.11.06.14 (Prevention of Significant Deterioration).

A person may not cause or permit the discharge of emissions from any installation, other than water in an uncombined form, which is visible to human observers.

Exceptions. Section A(1) of this regulation does not apply to the following:

Blast furnaces constructed before January 1, 1977 (casthouse building): 50 percent opacity as averaged over any consecutive 60-minute period;

Blast furnaces constructed on or after January 1, 1977 (casthouse building): 5 percent opacity as averaged over any consecutive 6-minute period, except for 20 percent opacity as averaged over any consecutive 6-minute period during drilling, oxygen lancing, and plugging of the furnace tapholes;

Electric arc furnace shop building: no visible emissions, except for 20 percent opacity during charging and 40 percent opacity during tapping;

Sinter plant building: 10 percent opacity as averaged over any consecutive 6-minute period;

Basic oxygen furnace shop building: 15 percent opacity from the basic oxygen furnace shop roof monitor based on a 3-observation rolling arithmetic average of the opacity records recorded on each of 3 calendar days of observation.

The provision described in §B(5) of this regulation is referred to as the 15 percent standard. The first exceedance of the 15 percent standard during each calendar year, from January 1 through December 31, does not constitute a violation of the 15 percent standard. The second exceedance and all subsequent exceedances of the 15 percent standard during the calendar year are prohibited.

Any source subject to §B(5) of this regulation shall, at a minimum, schedule one observation on each of three different calendar days per calendar week, and perform the observations on the days scheduled, unless weather or other conditions on one or more of those days prevent observations to be made in accordance with Method 9.

If weather or other conditions prevent Method 9 observations from being made, a person shall perform the missing observation or observations during that week or in the following 2 calendar weeks in addition to the minimum three observations required for each calendar week, unless prevented by weather or other conditions.

The owner or operator of a sintering plant equipped with a two stack wet scrubber system and subject to the particulate matter requirement in Regulation .04A of this chapter, shall assure continuous compliance with the particulate matter requirement in Regulation .04A of this chapter by maintaining the hourly average scrubber pressure drop and water flow rate to each scrubber in accordance with the operating conditions in §D(2) of this regulation.

Scrubber¹ Operating Conditions and Requirements.

One or more of the scrubbers shall be in operation whenever the sintering plant is in operation.

Compliance with particulate matter requirements is achieved if at any time the hourly block average of the scrubber pressure drop and water flow rate are not less than the values in §D(2) of this regulation.

The scrubber pressure drop and water flow rate shall be monitored by a continuous monitoring system and the monitoring system data made available to the Department upon request.

Stack Testing Requirements.

A person may not cause or permit the discharge of fugitive emissions of particulate matter from an iron and steel production installation unless reasonable control methods are employed to minimize emissions. These methods include the use of hoods and control equipment to capture emissions, other control techniques, and process restrictions.

Reasonable Control Methods Required to Satisfy §B(1) of this Regulation. Reasonable control methods required to satisfy §B(1) of this regulation are listed below for the installation specified, grouped by major buildings or structures. No other control methods are required for those buildings, structures, or installations. The reasonable control methods are:

All required reasonable control methods shall be designed to represent good engineering practice and constructed in accordance with the Department's permit to construct approval. The reasonable control methods employed shall be operated and maintained to comply with the visible emission standards set forth in Regulation .03A and B of this chapter and in accordance with any conditions imposed in the Department's permit to operate for that installation.

Emissions from control equipment constructed pursuant to §B(1) and (2) of this regulation, shall meet the requirements of §A of this regulation and Regulation .03A(1) of this chapter.

The discharge of emissions from air pollution control equipment constructed to capture coke oven pushing emissions in accordance with §B(2)(e) of this regulation may not exceed either 0.03 gr/scfd (68.7 mg/dscm) or 0.1 pound/ton (0.05 gram/kilometer) coke pushed, whichever is more restrictive. The pushing period is defined as commencing with the initial movement of coke and terminating with the hot car entering the quench tower.

Stack tests shall be performed using the EPA Test Method 10 or an alternative test method approved by the Department and the EPA.

An initial stack test shall be performed on or before May 1, 2006.

Additional stack tests shall be performed not later than 2-1/2 years after the previous test. Upon request, the specific dates on which each additional test is to be performed may be adjusted by the Department so that the testing is performed consistent with the schedules for other testing at the facility.

In order to determine the total carbon monoxide being discharged from the basic oxygen furnaces, tests shall be performed simultaneously at each stack through which the gases from the basic oxygen furnaces are exhausted.

Each test, with a duration of at least 1 hour, shall be considered a test run.

Compliance with the 1 percent standard shall be determined as the average of three test runs.

This regulation applies to a person who owns or operates an installation that has actual VOC emissions of 20 pounds or more per day located at an iron and steel production facility that has the potential to emit total plant wide VOC emissions of 25 tons or more per year.

Roll coaters at hot dip coating installations located at an iron and steel production facility are subject to COMAR 26.11.19.05 and federal New Source Performance Standards incorporated by reference at COMAR 26.11.06.12.

Hot rolling operations;

Cold rolling operations; and

Coating operations including both hot dip coating and electrolytic plating installations.

A person who owns or operates a sintering plant subject to this regulation shall meet an emissions standard calculated on a daily average basis of 0.25 pound of VOC per ton of sinter produced.

Until May 1, 2002, a person who owns or operates a sintering plant subject to this regulation shall demonstrate compliance with §C(1) of this regulation by conducting stack tests during the months of June 2001 and December 2001 in accordance with a test protocol approved by the Department.

A person who owns or operates a sintering plant subject to this regulation shall:

After the CEM system has been in operation for at least 24 months, the CEM data, emission standard, compliance rate and other information relative to the operation of the sinter plant shall be reviewed to determine if revisions are necessary.

Develop and maintain a good management practices plan for each installation;

By January 1, 2002, implement the good management practices plan to reduce VOC emissions; and

Make the plan available to the Department upon request.