Resource issues in the Steel Industry

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Resource issues in the Steel Industry
Jean-Pierre BIRAT, Jean-Sébastien THOMAS, Pete
HODGSON, Phlippe RUSSO, Valentina COLLA, José
Ignacio BARBERO, Borja PEÑA, Hermann WOLFMEIER,
Enrico MALFA

• Industrial Technologies 2012Integrating nano,
  materials and production
• Resource-Efficient Process Industries Workshop
• Aarhus, 19-21 June 2012

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Steel production, world (Mt/yr)
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Access to Resources, Security of Supply,
Scarcities, Criticity, Material Efficiency
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Concepts, words practices

• access to resources the Steel model has been
  globalization, since the 1908s, with very large
  capsize vessels and sourcing from Brazil
  Australia of very high grade iron ore and coals
• security of supply not an issue for the time
  being in Europe
• Scarcity-scarcities
• Long-Term scarcity absolutely not!
• Short-Term scarcity definitely yes!
• Materials efficiency Reduce, Reuse Recycle
  (3R's), organize Industrial Ecology synergies

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Resources for steel and structural materials

• Virgin Iron (iron ore) virgin metal (ores)
• Scrap Iron (recycled, secondary) metal scrap
• Reducing Agent (coal, coking coal, natural gas,
  oil, electricity)
• Alloying elements (Mn, Cr, Ni, Ti, Va, Nb, Al, B,
  Cu, Pb, Mo, Si, S, Zr, Fe)
• Refractories
• Logistics (transportation infrastructure and
  transport vehicles/vessels, "oceans' viginity")
• Land and ecological services

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Raw materials for the Steel sector
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Major traits and trends

• Long-term scarcity is never an issue
• Short-term scarcity induces price volatility and
  forces strategies of vertical upstream
  integration
• Criticity is not an issue this is the reason for
  the robustness of the steel sector, a core,
  structural sustainable (historically!) material
  with high social value
• a few hot spots (Ni, Ti, low-Fe bauxite, etc.)
  related to geopolitical issues, oligopolies, not
  real scarcity. But this may be just as serious
• Recycling of iron works well but we are moving to
  a closed loop economy for steel iron new
  issues
• many Industrial Ecology synergies already in
  place more can be done, but the price needs to
  be right
• limits are due to the finiteness of the planet,
  not of resources we need (logistics, land use)

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Iron mines in the world
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New mines opening up in Scandinavia
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Vertical integration of the steel business
(example of ArcelorMittal)
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Ecodesign3R's "Reduce"
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Ecodesign, reduce, dematerialization

• Ecodesign of steel processes (? SAT), steel
  grades, steel solutions, consumer goods
• Ecodesign of the life-cycle design for recycling
  (DfR), design for dismantling (DfD), design for
  shredding (DfS), design for sustainability (DfS)
• Sustainability Assessment of Technologies (SAT)
• Lightweighting its limits, do more with less
• more durable, longer-life products
• more intensive use of products (car sharing,
  curbside cars)
• dematerialization, lean economy, zero and
  near-growth, slow economy, etc.
• need for methodologies

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Reutilization3R's "Reuse"
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Reuse

• the model of the pre-industrial and traditional
  societies
• beams, rails, sheet piles are fairly commonly
  reused
• (Julian Allwood, WellMet2050 project)
• DfR Design for Reuse. What might the business
  models look like and what systems would need to
  be in place for these to be viable?

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Recycling, material to material3R's "Recycle"
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Recycling (material to material)

• Steel is recycled indefinitely ("the most
  recycled material") 85
• Steel recycling is NOT an externality (makes
  money, has been making money)
• Recycling leads to a closed-loop economy, over
  possibly the next 50 years
• Steel recycling allows for the co-recycling of
  other alloying elements

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Recycling (C2B, material to material)

• there are many different kinds of recycling
• Recycling does not always make good sense!
  Neither from a physical nor from an economic
  standpoint (e.g. cement, many plastics, CO2)

same material
value chain
downgraded use
other material, uses
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Industrial ecology models of downgraded recycling
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Other recycling B2B

• a recognized practice. Examples from the steel
  sector slag to clinker, EAF dust to Zn smelting,
  waste heat to district heat, etc.
• a matter of economics best routes should pay for
  themselves subsidies and taxes should remain
  within reason and help new technology start up
  their learning curve
• there are most probably many potential new
  options and opportunities to examine and many
  models (zero waste, urban mining, industrial
  mining, waste water recovery), which ought to be
  examined critically.. not simply taken for
  granted!

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Conclusions?
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Conclusions

• a long, 35 page ESTEP roadmap with more than 40
  directions to explore, which ought to let steel
  and steel-using sectors (virtually the whole
  economy) become more resource- and
  energy-efficient, greener and more sustainable
• no serious long term resource issues (scarcity),
  but price volatility due to oligopolies, market
  organization, speculation
• recycling in general requires much thought for
  the future at a technical level (quality of
  scrap, etc.) and in terms of internalization
  (industrial ecology synergies)
• Resource scarcity applies to things like
  logistics and ecological services (water, ocean,
  biodiversity)

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Thank you!

• Jean-Pierre BIRAT, Jean-Sébastien THOMAS, Pete
  HODGSON, Phlippe RUSSO, ARCELORMITTAL, France
• Valentina COLLA, SSSA, Italy
• José Ignacio BARBERO, Borja PEÑA, Tecnalia, Spain
• Hermann WOLFMEIER, voestalpine, Austria
• Enrico MALFA, CSM, Italy