Hatch professionals recognized with AIST awards for their contributions to the iron and steel industry

July 8, 2021

Nashville, USA—Hatch professionals were recently recognized by the Association for Iron & Steel Technology (AIST) for their contributions to the iron and steel industry with two Technology Committee Awards as well as an AIST Presidential Citation. Dr. Mitren Sukhram, Process Specialist, Pyrometallurgy was awarded the 2021 J.E. Johnson, Jr. Award, and a team of authors from Hatch and United States Steel Corporation (U.S. Steel or USS) were recipients of the 2020 Josef S. Kapitan Award. Both awards were received in the Ironmaking category. Additionally, Brittany MacKinnon, Process EIT, Pyrometallurgy, was awarded a 2021 Presidential Citation. All three awards were recognized at AISTech 2021, the iron and steel technology conference and exposition held in Nashville, USA last month.

The J.E. Johnson, Jr. Award was established in 1921 and supported by the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical, and Petroleum Engineers (AIME) from funds donated by Margaret Hilles Johnson. The award is given in memory of her husband, J.E. Johnson, Jr., a prominent engineer, and author in the field of iron blast-furnace construction and practice. The award is intended to encourage creative work in the branches of metallurgy or the manufacture of pig iron and is awarded to an individual who is forty years of age or younger. As the 2021 award recipient, Mitren Sukhram represents the first individual from Hatch to ever win this distinguished accolade.

“Since joining Hatch in 2014, Mitren has excelled at blast furnace ironmaking with many accomplishments that align with the values and expectations of the J.E. Johnson, Jr. Award,” said Ian Cameron, Principal Metallurgist, Ferrous at Hatch. “He has demonstrated a passion for blast furnace ironmaking, completed creative technical work, co-authored a new book on blast furnace technology with his Hatch colleagues[1] and demonstrated service to the industry through his leadership of AIST’s Ironmaking Technical Committee.”

The Josef S. Kapitan Award was established in 1953 as the “Journal of Metals Award” by the Blast Furnace, Coke Oven, and Raw Materials Committee of AIME. These awards are presented to the authors of cokemaking and ironmaking technical papers judged by the AIST Cokemaking & Ironmaking Technology Committee to be the best submitted for the conference at which they were presented. The 2020 Josef S. Kapitan Award was presented to a U.S. Steel-Hatch team represented by Ian Cameron, Principal Metallurgist; Mitren Sukhram, Process Specialist, Pyrometallurgy; Michael Bodley, Process Engineer, Pyrometallurgy; and Rishi Midha, Process EIT, Pyrometallurgy, for their paper “Hearth temperature control at USS blast furnace 14”.[2]

Blast Furnace No. 14 (BF14) is the largest blast furnace at U.S. Steel. In 2016, six years after the hearth was installed, BF14 experienced rapid hearth wall temperature increases under all three tapholes. U.S. Steel and Hatch embarked on an exhaustive root-cause analysis of the hearth cooling system, force balance assessment, and a process parameters review using big data advanced analytics. Various countermeasures were developed and implemented, which resulted in improvements in hearth temperature control, moderated temperatures, and increased production. The details of the approaches and results are presented in the award-winning technical article.

“Our work with U.S. Steel on BF14 brought together the top subject matter experts in iron and steel process engineering from both companies,” said Ted Lyon, Regional Managing Director, USA. “This award represents outstanding teamwork built on innovative thinking and technical excellence. I congratulate the team on their contribution to creating positive change in the iron and steel industry.”

The AIST Presidential Citation was established in 2004 and is intended to recognize individual members that have provided extraordinary service to the President or have made outstanding contributions to the Association for Iron and Steel Technology. Brittany (Britt) MacKinnon was recognized for her “contributions as a Young Professional and rising leader in AIST as demonstrated through her forethought and implementation of new programs in the past year” according to the citation. In her role as the Young Professional Chair for the Northern Member Chapter, she initiated the first virtual Member Chapter event in June 2020, and the Young Professionals and Board of Directors Mentor Mixer in April 2021.

Joe Petrolito, Managing Director, Bulk Metals, shared “We are thrilled to congratulate Britt on the award of the Presidential Citation—it is well-deserved. Britt’s enthusiasm and energy make her an asset to the Hatch team, and we are so pleased that her involvement with the AIST is being recognized as essential to the future success of AIST.”

Read more about Hatch’s iron and steel expertise.

1  Cameron, I., Sukhram, M., Lefebvre, K., and Davenport, W., with contributions from Sadri, A., Boivin, L., and Huerta, M., Blast Furnace Ironmaking: Analysis, Control, and Optimization. 1st Ed., Elsevier, 2019.

2 Cameron, I., Sukhram, M., Bodley, M., Midha, R., Entwistle, J. Grindey, Albanese, J., Lee, R., Rogers, D., McCoy, B. Al-Dojayli, R., Chomyn, M., Ghobara, K., Yasser Towsey, P. “Hearth temperature control at USS blast furnace 14 ” Proceedings of the Iron & Steel Technology Conference, May 6-9, 2019, Pittsburgh, Pa., USA, https://www.hatch.com/about-us/publications/technical-papers/2019/05/hearth-temperature-control-at-uss-blast-furnace

For more information, please contact:

Lindsay Janca
Global Director, Public Relations
Tel: +1 905 403 4199
Email: media@hatch.com

About AIST

The AIST is a non-profit organization with 15,500 members from more than seventy countries, representing an incomparable network of steel industry knowledge and expertise. The AIST Awards and Recognition Program is an important aspect of the AIST and its commitment to the iron and steel industry. Its purpose is to recognize, through peer review, the active leadership and significant contributions of individuals or companies to AIST and the global iron and steel industry. The AIST is a member society of AIME, founded in 1871.

About Hatch

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