Raw Material Security In Steel: Proactive Steps Required

Today, it is estimated that the global steel industry uses about 2 billion tons of iron ore, 1 billion tons of metallurgical coal and 575 million tons of recycled steel to produce 1.7 billion tons of crude steel annually.

- Tamajit Pain

The efficient use of natural resources is critical to sustainability. The industry uses advanced technologies to increase production yield rates and to facilitate the use of co-products. Steel’s advantage is that it is 100 percent recyclable and can be reused infinitely. As a result of the intrinsic recyclability of steel, the value of the raw materials invested in steel production lasts far beyond the end of a steel product’s life.

Raw materials in steelmaking

Key raw materials needed in steelmaking include iron ore, coal, limestone, and recycled steel.

The two main steel production routes and their related inputs are:

♦ Route 1: The integrated steelmaking route, based on the blast furnace (BF) and basic oxygen furnace (BOF), which uses iron ore, coal, limestone, and recycled steel. On average, this route uses 1,370 kg of iron ore, 780 kg of metallurgical coal, 270 kg of limestone, and 125 kg of recycled steel to produce 1,000 kg of crude steel.

♦ Route 2: The electric arc furnace (EAF) route uses primarily recycled steels and direct reduced iron (DRI) or hot metal, and electricity. On average, the recycled steel-EAF route uses 710 kg of recycled steel 586 kg of iron ore, 150 kg of coal and 88 kg of limestone and 2.3 GJ of electricity, to produce 1,000 kg of crude steel.

Around 70 percent of total global steel production relies directly on inputs of coal via the BF/BOF route. In 2017, about 1.2 Gt of crude steel was produced in BOFs, which required the output of about 1.1 Gt of BF (hot metal/pig iron) and about 200 Mt of scrap.

In 2017, global EAF output accounted for about 30 percent of global steel production (around 480 Mt), which required the output of about 60 Mt BF, 90 Mt of direct reduced iron (DRI) and 380 Mt of scrap.

Steelmaking materials markets