"Clean" steel has been produced: can this ultra polluting industry evolve?

In a statement published in late August 2021, the Swedish company SSAB claims to have "produced the first steel without fossil resource in the world" in its Hybrit-pilot factory, then have already delivered it to a client, Volvo.This first test is an "important step on the path of a chain completely free of fossil for the manufacture of iron and steel," said the company.

The use of the very selling expression "Green Steel", ie "green steel", demonstrates how SSAB wishes to make an advertisement.Especially since the company called on an artist to achieve ... a model modeled from this clean steel.While keeping this communication in mind, the potential of this new type of steel is so said to be real.

Archbone made from this "clean" steel, made by designer Lena Bergström.

Source: SSAB/LENA Bergström

To what extent can the iron and steel production chain really be "clean", that is to say decarbona?Such a decarbonization is of major ecological priorities of this decade.

An industry originally based on coal

The steel industry is essentially based on a raw material and a fuel, coal, the use of which is polluting.In fact, companies producing steel are one of those that emit the most greenhouse gases in the world - around 7.6 % of all emissions from the globe (4 % of emissions in France).However, the IPCC report published a few weeks ago recalls it well: all emissions must decrease now, to become zero as soon as possible.

But how to decarbonize an industry based on… coal?

Some companies, as the world reported in 2019, are trying to apply a circular economy where everything must be recovered and recycled. « En faisant entrer plus d’acier usagé dans la fabrication de notre acier, nous faisons baisser la part de fonte nécessaire, et donc le niveau d’émissions de CO₂ », affirmait le chef d’un de ces établissements à Dunkerque.Except that "lowering" the level of emission is in no way sufficient.To manage to decarbonize this production, the whole chain must be focused in this sense.And that coal is no longer a distant memory from A to Z: it should no longer be used as fuel or raw material.

The Hybrit pilot factory, for its part, results in a partnership between several Swedish entities: the LKAB mining company, dedicated to the extraction of the iron ore, the SSAB SSAB and the electricity supplier Vattenfall.Originally, in the steel manufacturing process, high stoves are used by combustion of coal, in order to reduce iron ore into iron sponges.But a solution is to replace coal with hydrogen.

At this stage, there is a first obstacle: for this replacement to be really clean, hydrogen must not be fossil, but produced from renewable energy.Moreover, the European Union is focusing a lot on clean hydrogen to achieve the objective of carbon neutrality by 2050.To use clean hydrogen, you still have to have access, and that this gas is therefore produced near factories.This is where Vattenfall comes in: the company provides LKAB and SSAB a local source hydroelectricity, a renewable energy which allows here to obtain hydrogen.

In June 2021, SSAB had managed to produce the first iron sponge made from this process.Then there is the conversion of this steel sponge.A "clean" solution is that it is converted into the ovens of a steelworks operating on electricity and recycled scraps, rather than in ovens based on the cast iron ore.

When all these criteria are met, which is the case here, then from start to finish of the chain are only used non -fossil raw materials and non -fossil energy.

The first steel delivery using all of this process has been given to the Swedish company Volvo, which intends to use it for vehicle prototypes.

How far decarbonization?

Given the very high SSAB impact on Sweden emissions, the company considers that it can reduce the country's total emissions by 10 % using this process.However, the total of SSAB's contribution to Swedish emissions is evaluated at 10 %.The company therefore intends, in theory, to put an end to the entirety of its carbon contribution through this.

But the process is today exclusively confined to this pilot factory.Some 100 tonnes of "clean" iron sponges were produced when SSAB produces 8.8 million tonnes of steel per year.However, SSAB projects itself by announcing converting its factories, on an industrial scale, by 2026.This company is not the only one to make such announcements in northern Europe: another Swedish steel company, H2 Green Steel, plans to build a steel factory without fossil fuel in the north of the country, with a renewable hydrogen installation directly integrated into the factory, by 2024.

The good news in this information is the proximity of these dates, all located before 2030.The other positive news is that the SSAB press release, bringing a complete and tangible achievement of clean steel delivery, demonstrates that these projects are not utopian.Such a press release can push competing companies to embark on the same dynamic.

To protect it, you have to understand the environment