Joseph J. Poveromo, age 74, received his B.S. Degree in Chemical Engineering at
Rennselaer Polytechnic in Troy, New York in 1968. After spending one year as a process
engineer at the Sinclair Oil Technical Center in Harvey, Ill, he joined the Center for Process
Metallurgy, Department of Chemical Engineering at the State University of New York at Buffalo
(SUNYAB) in 1969 where he studied under the academic advisement of the late Prof. Julian
Szekely. He received his M.S. degree based on his thesis on the “Vapor Deposition of Zinc” in
1971. His Ph.D. dissertation on “Blast Furnace Raceway and Stack Fluid Dynamics” was
completed in 1974.
Dr. Poveromo joined the Bethlehem Steel Research Department at the Homer Research
Labs in Bethlehem, PA in 1974. His main research and development were initially focused on
the blast furnace process where he made significant contributions to Bethlehem’s large, modern
blast furnace operations, as well as vintage smaller BF operations. He developed improved
charging practices for 2-bell top furnaces, coordinated establishment of data acquisition &
control systems, and initiated granulated coal injection and natural gas co-injection practices.
His value-in-use studies on coking coal and coke properties helped to reduce BF energy
consumption by quantifying benefits of improved coke properties on BF operation. He then
became heavily involved in Bethlehem’s iron ore operations in the USA and Canada, serving on
the Technical Advisory Committees of Iron Ore Company of Canada and Hibbing Taconite in
Minnesota. He promoted improvements in pellet chemical, physical and metallurgical properties
of pellets that led to BF performance improvements.
FLOGEN SIPS 2022 Awards: Dr. Joseph Poveromo, President, Raw Materials & Ironmaking Global, USA