ArcelorMittal Major investment for a greener future

Photo courtesy of Jean-Louis Vandevoorde.

ArcelorMittal has unveiled ambitious plans supported by a EUR 1.1 billion investment to decarbonise its fagship steel plant in North Sea Port. ArcelorMittal Belgium will thus reduce CO2 emissions by no less than 3.9t million per year by 2030, bringing them down by 40% compared to 2018.

At the end of September, ArcelorMittal signed a letter of intent with the Belgian federal and the Flemish regional governments on the introduction of new decarbonisation technologies in Ghent. The importance of the event was highlighted by the presence of Executive Chairman Lakshmi Mittal and CEO Adithya Mittal of ArcelorMittal and three ministers of each government, led by Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo and Flemish Minister-President Jan Jambon. The pace of investment in the greening of the Ghent site by the introduction of innovation technologies aimed at enhancing sustainability and circularity and reducing its environmental impact is impressive. A new milestone was reached early this year with the total make-over of blast-furnace B, which is now ready to use recycled waste wood and end-of-life plastics to replace some of the coal as fuel, at a cost of EUR 195 million. It reinforces the position of the steel plant as one of the most effcient in the world in terms of CO2 emissions per tonne of produced steel. They already stand at 25 to 30% lower than the world average. By their amplitude, the new plans will usher the steel plant into a new era altogether in what Manfred Van Vlierberghe, CEO of ArcelorMittal Belgium, described as the company’s ‘decarbonisation journey’. The effort does not go unnoticed. “This is one of the largest climate investments in Belgium and will anchor ArcelorMittal in the Ghent region”, Belgian Minister of Energy Tinne Van der Straeten declared.

The reduction of CO2 emissions by 3.9t million will be achieved by two means. The frst is the construction of a direct reduced iron (DRI) plant with a 2.5t million capacity and two electric furnaces, to operate alongside

Photo courtesy of ArcelorMittal Belgium.

the state-of-the-art Furnace B. The DRI plant will use natural gas in the frst stage, instead of coal to reduce iron ore, resulting in a large reduction in CO2 emissions compared with coal-based blast furnace ironmaking. But the installation will be hydrogen-ready, so as and when green hydrogen is available in suffcient quantities at affordable prices, the company will be able to produce DRI with near zero-carbon emissions. The two electric furnaces will melt the DRI and scrap steel, which will then be transformed in the steel shop into steel slabs and then further processed into fnished products. Once the DRI plant and the two electric furnaces are operational, the production of blast furnace A will shift gradually to the new installations. Blast furnace A will be closed as it reaches its end of life around 2025. By 2030, CO2 emissions will be decreased by around 3t million per year. The remaining reduction of 0.9t million by 2030 (compared to 2018) will come from various other decarbonisation initiatives, including the Steelanol/Carbalyst and Torero projects, due to be commissioned in 2022. The total reduction of ‘4% of emissions in Flanders’, as Flemish Minister for Economy Hilde Crevits put it, is equivalent to the greenhouse gas emissions from almost 850,000 cars driven for a year. ArcelorMittal Belgium thus makes a signifcant contribution to ArcelorMittal Europe’s ambition to cut CO2 emissions by 35% by 2030 and to become carbon neutral by 2050.

In its roadmap to 2050, ArcelorMittal Belgium follows three axes, two of which – further improvement of material and energy effciency (including increased scrap usage) and the replacement of carbon as a reductant with (ultimately green) hydrogen – are prominent in the new investments. The third axis, the implementation of smart carbon technologies such as replacing fossil carbon with circular and waste carbon (as in the Torero project), is illustrated by the pilot-project for the partial use of high-quality bio-coal instead of fossil coal as a raw material for its steel production process. The bio-coal is being responsibly sourced by Dutch company Perpetual Next, which produces the bio-coal using a patented high temperature torrefaction technology. The partnership started with an initial delivery of 30,000t to the Ghent plant. This volume can be scaled up to 350,000t on an annual basis. Compared to using fossil coal, 2.5t of CO2 are saved per tonne of bio-coal, which is crucial in the foresight that by 2050 steel demand is expected to double from current levels, which could lead to a corresponding increase of CO2 emissions with unchanged policies.