British Parliament to develop plan to decarbonise metallurgy

The industry directly employs 33,700 people, with another 42,000 people involved in supply chains.

The UK House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee has announced that it will conduct a study on Green Steel.

"Steel is a critical material in the UK's drive to reduce carbon emissions: it is an essential component of wind turbines and electric vehicles," the committee said in a statement. “However, the steelmaking process itself generates significant greenhouse gas emissions, producing nearly two tons of CO2 emissions per tonne of steel.”

According to the head of the committee, the decarbonization of the steel sector "is a real test of the courage of the government, as well as the ingenuity and ambition of British industry."

The industry association UK Steel welcomed the intentions of the Parliament to sort out the issues of "greening" the British

“Without a strong domestic British steel sector, we will never be able to confidently call ourselves a net zero economy – we will simply shift our environmental responsibilities to other countries. Steel is not just a historic industry that has built and supported communities, it is the foundation of our industrial future and a link to our past,” commented UK Steel CEO Gareth Stace.

The UK produces about seven million tons of crude steel per year, which is about 70% of the country's annual requirement. British steelmakers emitted about 12 million tonnes of carbon dioxide or 11.5% of all UK industrial emissions, including indirect emissions from electricity generation, in 2019.