Experts are cautiously optimistic about new global trends when it comes to greening up iron and steel production, Canary Media reports.
Global Energy Monitor recently released a report that found that low-carbon technologies such as the electric arc furnace, which replaces a higher-carbon alternative, account for a rising percentage of capacity in this sector. However, Canary Media cautions that "traditional coal-based capacity is also expanding."
A push toward greener production methods will help reduce the amount of health-harming pollution affecting nearby communities. For instance, residents living near the Edgar Thomson Plant in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania — which operates blast and basic oxygen furnaces along with a facility that produces purified coal, or "coke" — experience some of the worst air quality in the nation and face elevated cancer risks and higher childhood asthma rates, according to Canary Media.
Plus, it will help us in the fight against rising global temperatures — traditional steel making methods use coal during the production process and release carbon into the atmosphere, and the industry contributes up to 9% of global carbon pollution, Canary Media reports.
Across the world, governments and communities are pushing for alternatives to coal. For instance, some rural Virginia towns are adding over 1 million new jobs by focusing on solar technologies instead of coal. (Sign up for community solar.) Plus, Germany has closed over a dozen coal plants as part of its effort to phase out this fuel source by 2030.
Of course, the transition to cleaner steel production doesn't come without its challenges. GEM's report also noted a concerning trend: Over 300 million metric tons per year of blast furnace capacity is planned in 16 countries.
"In the last few years, we were really driving the point that we are so far behind [on decarbonization], we are not on track, there's so much work to do," Caitlin Swalec, one of the authors and GEM's heavy industry program director, told Canary Media. "This report is a bit more like cautious optimism."
Many older plants that are in need of updates have difficult decisions to make in the coming years: Do they simply spruce up their old dirty technologies or spend much more for greener options to carry them into the future?
But "if any new [steel] investment is to take place, it should not be in yesterday's technologies," Matthew Mehalik, executive director of the Breathe Project, warned, per Canary Media. "That's a continuation of a business model that produces steel at the expense of the health of vulnerable community members, which is the way that it's been happening for generations."
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