STORY: Inside Baosteel's lights-out factory: a look at cutting-edge technology & innovation
DATELINE: July 26, 2023
LENGTH: 00:05:42
LOCATION: SHANGHAI, China
CATEGORY: ECONOMY
 
SHOTLIST:
1. various of Uncle Ai exploring the Baosteel's super factory
 
STORYLINE:
 
SOUNDBITE  (Chinese): UNCLE AI, Vlogger at Bilibili
"Do you think I'm in a park? No, actually this is the internal landscape of the factory area where I'm standing. It's normally closed to the public, especially its "lights-out factory": it's always dark, with no lights on, and it is operated by robots 24 hours a day. It has a very cyberpunk vibe. What makes Baosteel's super factory so cool? Let's find it out together.
 
Running a steel factory is similar to running a bakery. You need to get some raw materials first -- iron ore. The difference is that its raw material yard is quite large.
 
What if I told you that the phone you're using to watch this video, as well as many aspects of your life, depend on these things? Would you believe me? If not, that's fine, I'll prove it to you. Coke is the best friend of iron ore. They go into the blast furnace together and merge under high temperature to produce liquid iron. But it's not perfect because a lot of wastewater, waste gas and slag are also produced. What would you do with them? Would you just dump them? That would be wasteful. Baosteel knows how to make use of the by-products: wastewater is turned into industrial salt, waste gas is converted into chemical products, and slag is transformed into building materials. Isn't Baosteel doing a great job in environmental protection? Otherwise, the animals in the zoo would not be happy.
 
By the way, the liquid iron we just saw is still cooling. While it's hot, we need to turn it into liquid steel. First, load it into a torpedo car, then let it drive itself to the converter, pour in the liquid iron, add the ingredients, raise the temperature, turn on the oxygen nozzle, start spinning, and stir. It doesn't make a coffee art, but it makes a latte. No, it makes liquid steel.
 
At this point, the liquid steel is hot on the outside and soft on the inside, just like melted chocolate. You can decide what "flavor" you want to make next, what size you want to roll it into, whether you want it to be "thick and greasy" or "thin and crunchy," you can have fun with it. For example, this thicker one can be used for offshore platforms, ships, and landmark buildings. The thinner one can be used for containers, engineering pipelines, and special vehicles. Even thinner ones can be used for cars, fridges, washers, TV sets, anything you want. It's even used to make pop-top cans and bottle caps.
 
Most of these are shipped in coils, yes, just like coils of paper. The robots then label them with their unique ID numbers for easy tracking and tracing. It's just a bit heavy, with one coil weighing several tons. It's not very workable to rely on human power alone, so the "lights-out factory" comes in handy!
 
Lifting and dropping coils, shuffling and sorting coils, these fully automatic robots can easily deal with steel coils that each weigh as much as an elephant. The material receiving machine picks up and sends the coils, scans and locates them automatically, and automatically releases and retrieves the coils. It is fully smart and unmanned, and the lights can be switched off when it's done. But before switching off the lights, since you're here, tell us your wishes for "black technology." Maybe the "lights-out factory" will help you achieve them. Everything is ready. Unmanned frame trucks transport these steel coils to the 24-hour all-weather terminal, where they are waiting to be shipped to all parts of the world. Of course! Friends at home and abroad, you need to queue up.
 
Earth scientists have found that iron ore has been on Earth since it was formed more than 4 billion years ago. I don't know if the colorful stones that Nuwa used to mend the sky in ancient Chinese mythology had iron ore, but we all know that human evolution is also a history of steel evolution. From the Iron Age to today's "steel forests," from blast furnace smelting to electric furnace technology, countless changes have happened in all aspects of our lives. Just like a coin has two sides, the industrial revolution has made us travel thousands of miles a day, and the information revolution has connected everything.
 
But at the same time, it has also made our air, soil, and water sources less clean. What should we do? Development must go on, but not in a crude way, but with higher quality.
 
So, we see that Baosteel has focused on intelligence and environmental protection in recent years. The former is for efficiency, and the latter is for future generations. Green industry is no longer just a topic of discussion between you and me, but is put into practice like it is here.
 
I believe we can see both vibrant scenes of bustling traffic and the poetic scenes of natural beauty. We can also experience the impact of the new industrial revolution driven by advanced manufacturing.
 
OK, this is the second episode of our "Exploring Smart Factories." If you enjoy it, please like and share it with your friends. I am Uncle Ai, and that's all for the "lights-out factory," but there is much more to China's intelligent manufacturing. Stay tuned for the next episode."
 
Xinhua News Agency correspondents reporting from Shanghai, China.
(XHTV)