Scrap key to lower steel emissions, says IEEFA study
Scrap key to lower steel emissions, says IEEFA study
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Expanding scrap steel recycling will be a significant step forward in decarbonizing the steel industry, says a new report from the Australia-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).
“Steel recycling is mature and cost-competitive,” say the report’s authors, IEEFA analysts Simon Nicholas and Soroush Basirat. “The quality of steel made from recycled scrap is on the rise even as carbon emissions from the process are poised to drop further with the continuing roll out of renewable energy.”
In 2020, global crude steel production was 1.88 billion metric tons. Of that, nearly three-quarters came from the integrated blast furnace and basic oxygen furnace process (BF-BOF), which IEEFA calls both energy- and carbon-intensive.
The groups says adopting more of the alternative electric arc furnace (EAF) option, whether using ferrous scrap or direct reduced iron (DRI), can help the steel industry lower its carbon emissions total.
Says co-author Basirat, “The energy consumption of BF-BOF processes is almost 10 times that of scrap-EAF. In addition, the direct emission of a BF-BOF process using iron ore and coal is 30 times higher than a scrap-based process.”
Steel production by the scrap-EAF route is by far the largest source of new steel in the United States, which is assisted by the high availability of scrap in such a large and mature economy, says IEEFA. In 2020, 71 percent of total crude steel production in the U.S. was via EAFs. In the EU, the figure was 42 percent.
Globally in 2020, steel produced from EAFs amounted to 26 percent of the world’s crude steel production, the bulk of it using scrap as feedstock.
The steel sector is estimated to directly emit 7 percent of the global pollution. There has been a recent focus on the potential use of green hydrogen to produce DRI to decarbonize production but, the analysts say, cost-competitive green hydrogen to use at scale is years away.
“Meanwhile, the use of scrap steel in EAFs is already a widely practiced, lower-emission steel production method,” the 22-page report says. “It is not on its own a solution to fully decarbonize the steel sector, but it is poised to help the global steel sector reduce emissions for the rest of the 2020s and in following decades,” says co-author Nicholas.
He continues, “This strongly hints at the potential for more scrap use in economies such as China, Japan and South Korea where steel recycling rates are much lower,” Nicholas says.
In 2020, China produced 57 percent of the world’s crude steel with 91 percent manufactured via the BF-BOF process, leaving just 9 percent produced via EAFs. By adopting steel recycling, China would improve its resource security by reducing its reliance on Australia’s iron ore and coking coal, says the IEEFA.
Beijing already has a ban on Australian coal imports in place and has recently resumed scrap steel imports. China’s scrap steel consumption surged by 47 percent to 138 million metric tons in the first half of 2021, says the institute.
As steelmaking via the scrap-fed EAF process does not use iron ore or coking coal, Nicholas and Basirat say, there are clear, long-term implications for exporters of these resources. Australia is by far the largest exporter of both.
There is debate over the potential for using scrap steel in producing some of the highest-quality grades, due to impurities such as copper, but these grades comprise a small portion of overall steel mill production.
In 2020, the share of the automotive sector – the most quality-sensitive category – was only 12 percent of total global steel consumption. The bulk of global steel production is for building and infrastructure products, where impurities are less of an issue and these can be manufactured via scrap-fed EAF processes, according to the IEEFA.
In addition, technology advancements mean that the scrap-fed EAF steelmaking process is now being used to make even the highest-quality automotive steel in the U.S., adds the institute.
The full IEEFA report can be viewed on this web page.]]>
Source: Recycling Today
Scrap key to lower steel emissions, says IEEFA study
<![CDATA[Expanding scrap steel recycling will be a significant step forward in decarbonizing the steel industry, says a new report from the Australia-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).“Steel recycling is mature and cost-competitive,” say the report’s authors, IEEFA analysts Simon Nicholas and Soroush Basirat. “The quality of steel made from recycled scrap is on the rise even as carbon emissions from the process are poised to drop further with the continuing roll out of renewable energy.” In 2020, global crude steel production was 1.88 billion metric tons. Of that, nearly three-quarters came from the integrated blast furnace and basic oxygen furnace process (BF-BOF), which IEEFA calls both energy- and carbon-intensive. The groups says adopting more of the alternative electric arc furnace (EAF) option, whether using ferrous scrap or direct reduced iron (DRI), can help the steel industry lower its carbon emissions total.Says co-author Basirat, “The energy consumption of BF-BOF processes is almost 10 times that of scrap-EAF. In addition, the direct emission of a BF-BOF process using iron ore and coal is 30 times higher than a scrap-based process.”Steel production by the scrap-EAF route is by far the largest source of new steel in the United States, which is…