Faced with the dual pressures of quality improvement, efficiency enhancement, and low‑carbon transformation, traditional iron and steel production faces bottlenecks in moving toward fewer‑person and unmanned operations: efficiency highly relies on manual experience and real‑time operation, making overall optimization and stable control difficult to achieve.The core of "AI + Production Centralized Control" is to build an intelligent control system that systematically replaces and enhances manual operations.By creating digital "brain, eyes, ears, and hands", we promote the transformation of production operations from "manual driving" to "intelligent driving", realizing autonomous collaboration and closed‑loop optimization of production control.

01 Overall Approach of "AI + Production Centralized Control"

Traditional models rely on on‑site and control room personnel for status identification, judgment, and operation. Our reconstruction aims to establish an autonomous closed loop of "perception – analysis – decision – execution":

(1)Decision Core:AI models integrating mechanism and data replace manual empirical judgment, realizing autonomous optimization and intelligent decision‑making of process parameters.

(2)Overall Perception:Visual and acoustic sensor networks realize 7×24‑hour intelligent monitoring of production environments, equipment status, and safety risks, replacing manual inspections.

(3)Precise Execution:Robots and automatic mechanisms replace high‑risk, repetitive manual on‑site operations, achieving reliable execution.

This transformation upgrades personnel roles from operators to system supervisors and optimizers, a key step toward fewer‑person operations.

02 Typical AI Application Scenarios for Production Centralized Control

(1)"Brain" of Production Centralized Control Based on AI Agents — Intelligent Decision & Process Optimization

To adapt to multi‑batch and small‑batch characteristics of iron and steel production and overcome challenges such as complex processes, strong upstream‑downstream coupling, and large working condition fluctuations, advanced AI agent technologies are adopted based on massive historical data, process mechanisms, and expert experience.For key processes including steelmaking endpoint control, continuous casting secondary cooling water regulation, reheating furnace automatic steel heating, and rolling temperature control, we have built a smart production brain with capabilities of "working condition identification, reasoning planning, and decision execution".This drives production optimization from "experience‑driven" to "data + knowledge dual‑driven", realizing autonomous optimization and intelligent decision‑making of process control.

Application Effect:Reheating furnace tapping temperature qualification rate stabilized above 90%, gas consumption per ton of steel reduced by 3%, oxide burning loss decreased by 6%, achieving overall collaborative optimization of quality, energy consumption, and efficiency.

(2)"Eyes" of Production Centralized Control Based on Machine Vision — Overall Perception & Safe Production

To adapt to complex and large‑scale iron and steel workshops and overcome pain points such as high reliance on manual monitoring, inspection blind spots, delayed response, and inefficient manual inspection, an AI vision middle‑platform is used as the core, integrating IoT and big data technologies.For key management and control scenarios including personnel violation identification, equipment status inspection, production quality detection, and environmental and hazard source monitoring, an "end‑edge‑cloud" collaborative perception network is built.This promotes the shift from "passive response" to "proactive prediction", realizing 7×24‑hour all‑round intelligent risk monitoring and early warning for the entire production area.

Application Effect:

Safety monitoring upgraded to all‑weather automatic inspection. Detection rate of typical violations increased by more than 50%, automation rate of key processes reached 98%, building an active and precise intelligent safety defense line.

(3)"Ears" of Production Centralized Control Based on Intelligent Voice — Voice Interaction & Intelligent Interconnection

To meet the high coordination requirements of iron and steel production centralized control and frequent production line information exchange, and overcome pain points such as information overload, cumbersome manual retrieval, undetectable early equipment faults, and manual confirmation of process logistics status in traditional control centers, intelligent voice recognition and voiceprint analysis are used as the core, integrating natural language processing and industrial knowledge graphs.

An intelligent auditory perception system is built for core operational needs including efficient interaction, rapid operation, equipment auscultation, and process monitoring.

This promotes human‑machine interaction from "manual viewing and checking" to "voice‑commanded operation", realizing efficient human‑machine interaction and accurate working condition judgment.

Application Effect:Key operation response time shortened by more than 70%, early warning of equipment faults realized, and auxiliary judgment of production status supported.

(4)"Hands" of Production Centralized Control Based on Intelligent Robots — Precise Execution & Flexible Operation

To adapt to high‑temperature, high‑dust operating environments in iron and steel production sites and overcome pain points such as high repeatability, strict precision requirements, high safety risks, low efficiency, large errors, and fatigue in traditional manual operations, multi‑modal perception (high‑precision vision, laser positioning, 3D point cloud) and mobile platforms such as AGVs are applied.Advanced AI agent technologies are adopted to build an "Iron & Steel Skillful Hands" intelligent robot system for high‑risk auxiliary operations including marking, sampling and testing, assistance and loading, and special processing.This promotes deep linkage between robots and production line equipment, precise collaboration between perception and execution, and flexible operation with "hand‑foot coordination".

Application Effect:Manual intervention for related high‑risk positions reduced by more than 80%, key operation accuracy exceeding 99.5%, providing reliable automated execution units for flexible production.

03 Practice & Promotion of "AI + Production Centralized Control"

The collaborative production centralized control system of "brain, eyes, ears, and hands" has been successfully applied in many enterprises including Nanjing Iron & Steel, Shagang, Yonggang, Rizhao Steel, Laiwu Steel, Baotou Steel, and TsingshanIndonesia.Its value is reflected inImproving operational resilience by reducing manpower dependence through autonomous system operation;Unleashing efficiency improvement potential through overall collaborative optimization to achieve dual enhancement of energy efficiency and quality;Precipitating core knowledge by transforming process experience into iterable digital assets.This system is not only a tool for reducing staff and improving efficiency, but also the core technological cornerstone driving iron and steel production to evolve toward an "intelligent driving" model and ultimately building unmanned "lights‑out factories".