Steel is the world’s most recycled material. This is good news because steel is everywhere in our lives. Numbers tell us that the global production of steel has now reached almost 1.5 billion tonnes each year. Geographically, China accounts today for almost half of the world’s steel production, increasing by over 500% since 2000. In 2012, China produced 708 million tonnes of steel. China is also a great consumer of steel, 60% of rebar, used in buildings to reinforce concrete, that is produced each year, is now consumed in China.
However, in order to produce each tonne of steel in China, 0.69 tonnes of coal is required in energy consumption in average, i.e. 500 million tonnes of coal each year is consumed to produce steel in China. This is equivalent to almost 7% of the world’s coal, and if China’s steel industry was a country it would rank 6th globally, ranking above both Germany and Canada in total primary energy consumption.
Good news is that China Steel Industry is changing greatly, and a series policies for steel industries’ transformation and upgrade have been issued by China government first in 2011 during China Sustainable Steel Summit. Part of the China “12th Five Year Plan”, these policies range within the field of M&A, restructuring, energy saving and emission reduction, closing backward facility, iron ore and steel price, also climate change, CSR, sustainability.
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Source: The Energy Collective, China Sustainable Steel Summit 2011
Photo credit: Wikipedia
Camilla G.//SMC Editor
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