NW China SOE reaping benefits of technological innovation

LANZHOU, March 28 (Xinhua) -- In a production workshop at the 65-year-old state-owned enterprise (SOE) Jiuquan Iron and Steel (Group) Co., Ltd (JISCO), northwest China's Gansu Province, this year's first shipment of 316H stainless steel is ready for the final quality test before delivery.

Hu Huanzhang, a JISCO Group staff member, cooperated with an R&D team of 24 engineers and developed 316H stainless steel through a technical breakthrough and process optimization at the end of last year.

316H is mainly used in the manufacture of key stainless steel materials suitable for use with fourth generation nuclear-power reactors, said Hu, adding that this environment places higher demands in terms of the hardness of a material at high temperature, high radiation and anti-corrosion, impact strength and stability.

Acquiring this kind of stainless steel previously relied on imports, and so the company formed a technical team in 2019 to engage in this key bottleneck technology development.

Zhao Dejiang, the product development engineer, recalled that the biggest hurdle during the four-year R&D process was the precise control of ferrite content.

"The content of ferrite has to be less than 1 percent," Zhao said. "Just like pouring water into juice, even slight variations can affect the final result."

The team made a major breakthrough in the lab after multiple tests and numerous failures within 700 days. It then took nearly a year to commercialize the lab results and realize mass production of the first batch of 112 tonnes of products by the end of 2022.

At present, 316H stainless steel produced by the JISCO is being steadily supplied to a nuclear power project in Xiapu, east China's Fujian Province.

During the past few years, the JISCO was embarrassed by disadvantages of product structure, overcapacity and low efficiency, and thus decided to bank on high-tech innovation to turn the tide amid an industry slowdown.

Since 2020, this provincial SOE's proportion of main business revenue investment in technology has shown a steady growth trend.

In January 2023, the company's R&D input intensity reached 3.29 percent, with a year-on-year increase of 0.66 percent, according to the financial statements of the company.

Driven by technological innovation, a lot of new changes have taken place. For instance, old foundries filled with dust and polluted air have been transformed with the introduction of 3D printing technology.

"Traditionally it was time consuming to make a single handmade casting product. Sometimes the production process could last a week," said Su Wen, factory manager of a precision casting foundry of Gansu Western Heavy Industry Co., Ltd, JISCO Group.

He said that by using 3D printing, the casts can now be made by digital molds. This means the printing process can be completed within half a day.

"3D printers facilitate a higher degree of accuracy of sand cores. They have also doubled the productivity of the factory, and reduced the burden of manual labor on the workforce," Su said.

The 3D printing casting products have been applied in the fields of hydropower, nuclear power electricity and automobile manufacturing. Orders for the first five months of this year have been fully booked and the factory is now working at full capacity.

Last year, both the business revenue and industrial output value of the company exceeded 100 billion yuan (about 14.53 billion U.S. dollars). With continuous investment in innovation in terms of production technology and application, the SOE has speeded up its green transformation and continues to expand its market share.