ArcelorMittal launches XCarb; commitment to producing carbon-neutral steel
18 March 2021
Global steel-maker ArcelorMittal launched its first three XCarb initiatives as part of the company’s effort to deliver on its 2050 net-zero commitment. XCarb will ultimately bring together all of ArcelorMittal’s reduced, low and zero-carbon products and steelmaking activities, as well as wider initiatives and green innovation projects, into a single effort focused on achieving demonstrable progress towards carbon-neutral steel.
To support its launch, ArcelorMittal announced three XCarb-branded initiatives:
XCarb green steel certificates, which will enable support for ArcelorMittal customers as they seek to reduce their Scope 3 emissions;
XCarb recycled and renewably produced products for customers; and
XCarb innovation fund.
Our launch of XCarb brings the full breadth of our decarbonization activity together under a single umbrella brand. It aims to demonstrate to stakeholders the diverse range of initiatives we are undertaking in pursuit of our 2050 net-zero goal while also providing our customers with solutions which help them address their own carbon reduction targets, demonstrating the important role steel has to play in a future, circular economy.
—Aditya Mittal, CEO, ArcelorMittal
XCarb green steel certificates. Across ArcelorMittal Europe - Flat Products operations, the company is investing in a broad range of initiatives to reduce carbon emissions from the blast furnace. These initiatives range from flagship Smart Carbon projects, such as Torero (transforming biomass into bio-coal to replace the use of coal in the blast furnace) and Carbalyst (capturing carbon-rich blast furnace waste gas and converting it into bio-ethanol, which can then be used to make low-carbon chemical products) to capturing hydrogen-rich waste gases from the steelmaking process and injecting them into the blast furnace to reduce coal use.
These effort-intensive investments result in considerable CO2 savings, which can be passed onto customers in the form of the steel industry’s first- certification scheme. CO2 savings are aggregated, independently assured, and then converted into XCarb green steel certificates using a conversion factor that represents the average CO2 intensity of integrated steelmaking in Europe.
The scheme therefore provides customers with the opportunity to buy certificates attached to their physical orders of steel, enabling them to report a reduction in their Scope 3 carbon emissions in accordance with the GHG Protocol Corporate Accounting and Reporting Standard. The company anticipates it will have 600,000 tonnes of equivalent green steel tonnes available by the end of 2022.
XCarb recycled and renewably produced. XCarb recycled and renewably produced has been designed for products made via the Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) route using scrap steel. Recycled and renewably produced means that the physical steel was made with recycled material (scrap) using renewable electricity, giving it an extremely low CO2 footprint that can be as low as approximately 300kg of CO2 per tonne of finished steel when the metallics are 100% scrap.
This customer offer is for both flat and long products. The electricity used in the steelmaking process is independently verified, with a ‘Guarantee of Origin’ given that it is from renewable sources.
XCarb innovation fund. ArcelorMittal has launched an innovation fund which will invest up to $100 million annually in groundbreaking companies developing pioneering or breakthrough technologies that will accelerate the steel industry’s transition to carbon neutral steelmaking. To be eligible for funding, companies will have to be developing technologies which support ArcelorMittal on its journey to decarbonise. The technology also needs to be commercially scalable.
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