SSAB to supply fossil-free steel for construction equipment
SSAB says it has entered into an agreement with global construction equipment manufacturer Putzmeister to supply future fossil-free steel for use in manufacturing products such as concrete pump trucks and concrete mixers.
SSAB and Putzmeister have a long history of partnership and technical cooperation, Kallanish understands. By using SSAB’s Strenx high-strength structural steel and Hardox wear plates, Putzmeister has developed very strong and lightweight truck chassis, pump crane booms and concrete mixer drums. The lighter machines increase machine performance but also reduce carbon footprint, SSAB says.
This agreement replaces conventional steel with steel made via Hybrit technology, developed by SSAB with mining company LKAB and energy company Vattenfall, using green hydrogen and fossil-free electricity.
Christian Koehl Germany
Dillinger and Vattenfall sign MOU on wind projects
Platemaker Dillinger and energy group Vattenfall Europe Windkraft have signed a declaration of intent to accelerate the use of CO2-reduced steel in future wind projects.
For Dillinger, creating early demand for CO2-reduced steel is crucial to advancing investment in this technology and the decarbonisation of the steel industry, Kallanish hears from the steelmaker.
“We are investing around €4.6 billion ($4.8 billion) in the decarbonisation of our German production sites with the support of the federal and state governments,” says Stefan Rauber, Dillinger ceo.
“The fact that Vattenfall wants to implement its ambitious climate targets with this steel indicates to us the demand for CO2-reduced steel and gives us momentum for our Power4Steel decarbonisation project.”
“The use of CO2-reduced steel, especially in our offshore wind farms, is an important lever in achieving our sustainability goal,” says Samira Barakat, vice president of partnerships and business transformation at Vattenfall.
Christian Koehl Germany
Hybrit initiative presents final report
Sweden’s Hybrit initiative will present the results of six years of research into fossil-free direct reduced iron-making technology in a final report to the Swedish Energy Agency, Kallanish learns from SSAB, a partner in the project.
Hybrit is a collaboration between SSAB, mining company LKAB and energy company Vattenfall, which have received several patents based on the results. The project is now continuing in the next phase where the process is to be implemented on an industrial scale.
The pilot phase resulted in the development of a new hydrogen-based technology for efficient fossil-free iron and steel production with 0.0 tonnes of CO2 emissions per tonne of steel. It also developed a new fossil-free iron product – sponge iron – that has significantly better properties than iron reduced with fossil gases such as natural gas. It also produced an efficient process practice for melting fossil-free sponge iron into crude steel in an electric arc furnace.
The project is the first in the world to demonstrate that the fossil-free value chain – from iron ore to steel – works on a semi-industrial scale. So far, more than 5,000 tonnes of hydrogen-reduced iron have been produced at the pilot plant in Luleå. Customers such as Volvo, Epiroc, Peab and many more are already using the fossil-free steel in vehicles, heavy machinery, buildings and consumer products.
Christian Koehl Germany
