Day: 6 March 2026

Italy steel heavy plate prices widened upward during the week to Thursday March 5, while the Northern Europe market remained stable despite the conflict in the Middle East, rising energy prices and higher offer prices.

Italian heavy plate prices moved up with a spike in energy prices in Europe and higher slab feedstock prices adding to bullish offers because of the conflict between Israel, the US and Iran.

Fastmarkets’ weekly price assessment for steel domestic plate, 8-40mm, exw Southern Europe, was €700-730 ($811-846) per tonne on Thursday, widening upward by €10 per tonne week on week from €700-720 per tonne.

“As for plate, there is the slab effect and there is the gas effect – energy prices [jumping upward] since the start of the Iran [conflict],” one producer source said, who added that production costs have consequently risen.

Dutch TTF Natural Gas Futures rose considerably following the initial military strikes on Iran by Israel and the US on February 28, with gas prices rising to a peak of €54.29 per MWh on March 3 from €31.96 per MWh on Friday. Dutch TTF Natural Gas futures prices started to fall after Tuesday, to €48.77 per MWh on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Italian plate offers were made at €750 per tonne ex-works for May production.

Slab feedstock offers also increased in the week due to higher freight costs, geopolitical uncertainty and disruption of Iranian supply to the global market.

Northern Europe
Steel plate prices in Northern Europe’s domestic market remained unchanged, despite higher energy costs.

Fastmarkets’ weekly price assessment for steel domestic plate, 8-40mm, exw Northern Europe, was €720-770 per tonne on Thursday, unchanged week on week.

A group of almost a dozen US states sued President Donald Trump’s administration to block the 10% global tariffs imposed in the aftermath of the Supreme Court tariffs decision.

Trump signed a proclamation implementing a 10% global tariff under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 on Feb. 20, the same day the high court overturned his country-specific duties. The law authorizes a president to impose temporary tariffs of up to 15% for 150 days.

The coalition of states, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James, filed a lawsuit with the US Court of International Trade on March 5. The states are seeking an order that prevents the Section 122 tariffs from being implemented and would require the federal government to issue refunds to states for the tariffs costs they paid.

They argue that the tariffs do not meet the requirements of Section 122 and violate the Constitution’s protection of the separation of powers, pointing to how only Congress has the power to tax and impose tariffs, not the president. The Supreme Court referenced a similar argument in its decision, determining that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, which Trump invoked to implement the country-specific duties, does not authorize a president to impose such executive action.

The coalition argues Trump’s order does not meet other requirements of Section 122, including that tariffs should be applied consistently without product exceptions, and does not meet the definition of a “balance of payments” deficit required by the law.

They say in the court filing that Trump’s changes in tariff policy create significant costs for states as agencies piece together policy from social media posts, executive orders, proclamation and other sources.

The Trump administration will “vigorously defend the president’s action in court,” Kush Desai, a White House spokesperson, said in a statement to Platts, a part of S&P Global Energy.

“The President is using his authority granted by Congress to address fundamental international payments problems and to deal with our country’s large and serious balance-of-payments deficits,” Desai said.

James is joined by attorneys general from 21 other states as well as Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro and Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear. She led a similar lawsuit in April 2025 with 11 other attorneys generals to halt the IEEPA tariffs.

No president has imposed tariffs under Section 122. Trade attorneys have raised legal questions about the law’s implementation, but said they’d be surprised if the courts issued an injunction against a tariff that lasts only five months.

However, if Trump seeks to extend the 150-day time frame or issue a new proclamation to reset the clock, the administration will likely face additional litigation.

The Section 122 tariff exempts USMCA-compliant goods and does not stack on top of Section 232 sectoral tariffs, which include 50% rates on steel, aluminum and copper imports. While most metals are exempt from the Section 122 tariffs, some materials, like pig iron, will face the new rate. However, the 10% duty is lower for some countries than what was previously imposed under the per-country IEEPA duties.

Other materials, like aluminum scrap, are mostly exempt from Section 122, but only because they fall under the exemptions for USMCA-compliant goods from Canada and Mexico.

UK domestically-produced steel is being excluded from public and private infrastructure procurement due to “short-sighted” low-emission specifications, at a time when the industry is transitioning, Kallanish heard from a panel at this week’s Make UK conference in London.

Gareth Stace, director general, UK Steel, highlighted the Welsh government as an example of policymakers excluding British Steel-made construction steel for being produced via the blast furnace route, despite the firm’s intention to move to electric arc furnace steelmaking.

“Many short-sighted projects say ‘we need so-called green steel’, [but] there’s no agreed global definition of green steel, so they see green steel as steel from the electric arc furnace route,” he said.

Therefore, buying EAF-produced steel from abroad allows buyers to tick boxes for purchasing low-carbon steel. Whereas buying domestically means “ensuring that that company has the money to invest to actually transition,” he added.

Alasdair McDiarmid, assistant general secretary, Community Union, highlighted other UK infrastructure projects such as Net Zero Teesside and Lower Thames Crossing where foreign steel has been used on the basis of “environmental carbon requirements”.

“There are two almost conflicting arguments, the drive to go green and there’s what we want to do which is support UK industry and UK jobs,” he said.

Meanwhile, Peter Quinn, director of sustainability and environment, Tata Steel UK, highlighted the lack of “nuance” in specifications that define low-CO2 steel.

“There’s a battleground out there; there’s a lot of people with lots of vested interests representing steel companies and governments across the whole world who’ve all got their view about [how] low CO2 should be defined,” he said.

He also highlighted contracts that now cannot be fulfilled by domestic steelmakers due to stricter customer requirements. “We can’t supply to a dodgy specification that someone else has written in a boardroom somewhere on the other side of the world,” he observed.

Quinn noted the plan to decarbonise the UK’s electricity grid by 2035. “We’ll be making steel from scrap, which has arisen in the UK, melting with electricity which is net zero … it takes a little bit of time to get there.”

He saw it as “ridiculous” for customers to not buy from Tata Steel now even though it is “demonstrably” on a journey to decarbonise.

Meanwhile, changes to frameworks could also help domestic producers supply more steel into upcoming infrastructure projects. Carles Rovira, chief executive at 7 Steel, said: “When you see the energy transition, SMRs, offshore, the infrastructure the UK needs to build, if we have the right conditions that can supply us with some growth for steel, because that’s going to be future construction, or building overall the UK infrastructure, and that is coming in the next 10-15 years. If we have the right framework now, we will be able to supply more of those growth opportunities.”

Germany’s thyssenkrupp group has confirmed to Kallanish that its strategy is to spin off its divisions, “once they are fit for the capital market.”

The group notes that tk Materials Services in on the right track for such a move and is optimistic that the company will prevail on the capital market. It did not give a timeline for its intention.

The Materials Services division is one of Europe’s largest steel distribution and trading companies, with major activities in North America, which it intends to expand. In the fiscal year through September 2025, it achieved an order intake of €11.4 billion ($13.3 billion).

This comes following media reports that the steelmaker could sell off, list, or divest the division this year. The group is considering changing the business’s legal form to keep control in case of a majority sale, Reuters is reported as suggesting.

A spin-off of tk Materials would come in the wake of the group’s ongoing efforts of separating from its steelmaking unit tk Steel. It is currently in negotiations with Jindal. Thyssenkrupp’s strategy for some time now has been the relative independence for all its divisions, and has achieved this so far for its elevators and defence activities.

The Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA) presented by the European Commission on Wednesday has been received with mixed sentiment by steelmakers and significant steel users.

Outokumpu has welcomed the proposal to increase demand for clean products. “The Industrial Accelerator Act signals a decisive shift toward an industrial strategy that integrates climate policy with industrial competitiveness,” it says in a statement.

However, the stainless steelmaker is calling for a clear “Made-in-EU” requirement to also include steel, and to introduce an EU low-carbon steel label.

Meanwhile, Germany’s steel federation WV Stahl, criticises the 25% low-emission steel quota for public procurement for not requiring domestic European-made steel.

“The IAA does create demand for low-emission steel, but does not facilitate structural demand for domestic steel production in the EU,” the federation notes.

For others, the IAA’s local content requirements, which impact concrete and aluminium, though not steel, are too high.

The association of mechanical engineering and machinery builders, VDMA, says the local content element is overweighed in the draft, and will not help the market’s structural weakness or the image loss of technological leadership.

“A ‘Buy European’ approach is justified only if security issues are concerned,” Kallanish learns from VDMA’s statement.

The association does welcome that the mandatory quota of green steel in public projects remains limited in the policy.

VDMA points at the contradiction that compulsory green steel usage means a burden for suppliers of technology, which itself is indispensable to achieving Europe’s climate targets.

The European steel and hydrogen industries, represented by trade bodies Eurofer and Hydrogen Europe, have called on Brussels to tighten the steel public procurement rules proposed in the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA) regulation.

Wednesday saw the long-awaited publication of the IAA legislative proposal. The European Commission (EC) proposes low-carbon requirements for public procurement and public support schemes in certain sectors, including steel, but steel is excluded from the “Made in EU” requirement.

“This measure will give investors confidence and predictability, boosting innovation and making clean steel a core part of the EU’s industrial future,” the EC states, noting the draft regulation will now be negotiated by the European Parliament and European Council before adoption.

Eurofer argues that more is needed to support green steel made in Europe, as the proposed quota does not require the low-carbon steel to be produced in the region.

“25% of public procurement represents less than 5% of the total steel market, and public support schemes vary widely across member states,” it says in a note seen by Kallanish. “Without stronger and clearer demand signals, these measures may not provide the long-term certainty needed for major industrial investments. To make lead markets work, the EU must ensure it supports low-carbon steel made in Europe, not made in third-countries.”

The association is calling for a clear definition of “Made in Europe” for steel, based on steel melted and poured in the European Union and European Economic Area. It also seeks the application of both low-carbon and European-origin criteria in the IAA; a robust labelling framework to support lead markets; and affordable electricity prices to further enable steel decarbonisation.

According to Responsible Steel, the sliding scale concept, also known as Steel Decarbonisation Scale, offers a technology-neutral approach, evaluating steel production based on greenhouse gas emission intensity and the share of scrap used.

Hydrogen Europe meanwhile says the proposal is “a step forward but lacks ambition”. Whilst it agrees that steel quotas in public procurement for buildings, vehicles and infrastructure are key to providing demand certainty, it says the 25% target will need to be raised “to create a true lead market”.

“A clear label on low-carbon steel – based on a sliding scale approach – should underpin such ambition on lead markets,” the trade body continues. “A sliding approach would help create demand for both primary and secondary steel, accounting for its carbon footprint and level of scrap recycling. But this has been delayed to later implementation under the Ecodesign framework, which gives industry and investors the wrong signal.”

Hydrogen Europe says that without a strong clean steel definition with product-based labelling and certification system, steel producers would be incentivised to maximise scrap use, which is limited by high-quality scrap availability. “For a deep transformation of the steel industry, continued investment in hydrogen-based primary steelmaking is essential,” it concludes.