Tata's Port Talbot plant may have to “give up” on making new steel, according to the firm behind a green steel plant.
A boss at H2 Green Steel in Sweden said the UK lacked the conditions for a switch to hydrogen-powered furnaces and should focus on recycled steel instead. Kajsa Ryttberg-Wallgren warned the UK steel industry risked a “slow death” if not.
A Tata spokesman said it was committed to greener steelmaking in the UK. An announcement has been expected for some time on the Port Talbot plant's decarbonisation plans. Unions previously said Tata intended to close both blast furnaces at the site, which rely on coal and manufacture brand new – or virgin – steel.
Instead of the blast furnaces, an electric arc furnace would be installed, which melts scrap material. This would eventually be run off clean electricity from the grid, significantly reducing the site's massive carbon footprint.
There are fears up to 3,000 jobs could be lost in the process, while the UK could be left unable to produce its own virgin steel and left reliant on imports.
But in November, Tata said it would consider the findings of an independent report which is understood to recommend maintaining blast furnace steel production for a number of years. At Boden in northern Sweden, H2 Green Steel is constructing what is set to become the world's first large-scale green hydrogen-powered steelworks, at a cost of £4.8bn (€5.5bn).
The clean fuel is made using electricity which comes mainly from a large hydro scheme nearby, providing constant and reliable renewable power. The area has an abundance of green energy as well as another vital ingredient – high quality iron ore.
The plan at Boden is to produce about five million tonnes of virgin steel a year by 2030 as the company eyes up other opportunities in Canada and Brazil.
Countries like the UK, by contrast, lack the “right conditions as of now”, claimed Ms Ryttberg-Wallgren, H2 Green Steel's executive vice-president.
“Will you have to give up on virgin iron-making? Probably yes,” she told BBC Wales News.
“It will be a slow death if not.”
Producing the required volume of green hydrogen affordably would be “very difficult if you don't have baseload power”, she added. Relying on intermittent power from offshore windfarms – as could be the case in Wales – would be more costly and so “the case is not bankable”, she claimed.
Her suggestion was that plants like Port Talbot should focus on specialising in recycling steel using electric furnaces.
“You have a really strong automotive customer base in the UK for instance that is willing to pay a premium – they're really searching for green steel products,” she said.
Prof Cameron Pleydell-Pearce, director of Sustain, Swansea University's research hub for a greener steel industry, said he believed there were “significant opportunities for scrap-intensive steel production”.
Holding an empty can of coconut milk, Prof Pleydell-Pearce said it could ultimately end up as part of a solar-panelled roof on an environmentally-friendly home.
“We could develop a whole economy around this in south Wales,” he explained.
“We're going to be doing a lot more in terms of looking after that material and seeing it travel in a responsible way through the supply chain back to the steelmakers.
“And there are going to be lots of jobs associated with that as we move to a circular economy.” However, he said it was important not to dismiss alternative solutions for Port Talbot.
He said blast furnaces could be retained using carbon capture and storage or utilisation technology, while hydrogen-powered production was also “not impossible”.
“People need to understand there's not a 100% right way of doing this,” he said. Ben Burggraaf, chief executive officer of Net Zero Industry Wales, said Tata's plans to build an electric arc furnace were “the start of the journey” and hydrogen could play a part.
Major industries in south Wales are working on a plan that could see large-scale production of the fuel initially using natural gas, with carbon emissions shipped away to be stored under the sea. Green hydrogen production would follow as floating offshore windfarms were built, Mr Burggraaf added.
Tata Steel said: “Electric arc furnace technology is currently the most practical and economically sustainable way to cut carbon emissions and secure the future for steelmaking at Port Talbot.
“The UK produces 10 million tonnes of scrap steel a year, which could be used in electric arc furnace steelmaking.
“This technology will cut our emissions by five million tonnes a year – the equivalent of almost two million homes.
“We are still considering other ways to reach carbon-neutral steel production across all our UK plants in the future, which could include hydrogen or carbon capture technology in addition to our current plans.”
— CutC by bbc.com
