EUROFER – Steel in circular economy [video]

Steel in the Circular Economy

Steel is a 100% recyclable, ‘permanent’ material, which loses none of its unique properties when properly processed. The European steel industry works hard to ensure that the steel it produces can be reused, recovered, and recycled. It also ensures that steel production’s by-products, such as slags and process, gases are put to the best possible uses.

This EUROFER videos explains issues arising in the circular economy for the steel industry. It shows that steel can help mitigate CO2 emissions and help reduce product lifecycle emissions. Steel’s characteristic as a ‘permanent’ material means it can be easily reused and subsequently recycled in a constant loop. It demonstrates the large degree to which steel production retains as much of the material created during steel production and is able to make use of its by-products.

More information about steel and the Circular Economy is available at: www.eurofer.eu

Transcript

This is steel. It is everywhere – all around us in our day-to-day lives. You can find it in cars, drinks cans, buildings, machinery, ships, windmills, trains and more. Steel products are durable and reusable, but even good things come to an end eventually. But with steel, nothing goes to waste. End-of-life steel artefacts can be reused or reborn as something else. Steel is 100% recyclable, 100% of the time. [slight pause] A permanent material, at the heart of the circular economy. About half of the steel made in Europe today is from ferrous scrap, via Electric Arc Furnaces and in Blast Furnaces. Steel production also results in useful by-products. These go on to have lives of their own as fundamental materials in other sectors, such as cement, chemicals and energy generation. This is industrial symbiosis in action. For now, there is not enough scrap to satisfy the need for new steel, but at some point in the future, recovered and recycled scrap will be in balance with demand. Steel use in the economy will be completely circular. In the meantime, the European steel industry is constantly innovating to create new, better grades of steel and new, cleaner production techniques. These help reduce the amount of steel needed to make things, improve reuse and recycling rates, and retain steel production’s by-products in the Circular Economy.