USE FOR SCRAP IRON.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20890, 4 June 1931, Page 17

USE FOR SCRAP IRON.

POSITION IN AMERICA. GROWING POSSIBILITIES. Tho growing importance of scrap iron and steel is the subject of an article in tho Commerco Monthly. Last year large quantities of scrap iron from tho abandoned railway yards at Newmarket were shipped to America. Tho possibility of such scrap iron being used for commercial purposes was tested in Auckland some years ago, when quantities of the material were tak?n to Onehunga for snelting purposes. Although tho junk wns productive of a large amount of pood iron, the experiments proved unprofitable. Several expensive processes were required to treat the iron successfully. Tho same difficulties of expense were experienced near Dunedin. A member of a city engineering firm stated recently that any prospect of development of scrap iron utilisation in New Zealand was very remote. The export of the iron to America, however, when a larp;o quantity of the material could bo collected in ono area might bo a profitable investment, he said. The articlu in the Commerco Monthly states that :many new industrial records had boen created both in production and consumption. Particularly did the iron and steel industry reflect this broad activity with tin; steel-ingot output reaching a new peak. Tho increasing requirements for this metal had in th» last decade brought to the foreground the uso of scrap material in steel-making. As a consequence scrap recovery, which received attention some years ago, was now reiiognised as having an important place in tho country's economic structure.

In many :respects the gathering, sorting and soiling of iron and, steel scrap was becoming one of the substantial industries of the country. Years ago, before the word by-product carried with it the connotation of increased income that it did to-day, wante material was waste. The problem was how to discard it, rather than how much money might bo realised from its st.lo or what savings could be effected in its use. Large sums were often spent to got rid of unmarketable material.

The importance of such waste recovery to-day might be realised from the fact that about 34,000.000 tons of scrap iron and steel v/ere used annually by the steel mills, blast, furnaces and iron foundries throughout tho country. The tonnage of scrap thus used had more than doubled in the last decade and a-half. The use of scrap iron and steel by the steel industry was increasing because it was economical, saved time and produced as good steel as that made with tho exclusive use of pig iron. Before now the buying of iscrap by mills and furnaces was

considered an unpleasant task, necessary for economical purposes. Tho responsibility of buying scrap was indeed substantial. The purchaser must know what scrap affo-ded the best results, understand the various gradings, assortments and prices, so that in a period of shortage he was capable of obtaining the scrap most adaptable to his purposes.