Iron and Steel
Steel is one of the most prominent metals, which has been playing a very dominant role in industrial developments well as economic and strategic growth of any economy. As a result of its exceptionally high strength and formability properties, steel is used in every aspect of our lives including automotives, rails, whitegoods, ships, energy structure and many more. It is also the most prominent building block of our houses, constructions, and infrastructure. Globally, 1874 million tonne (MT) of steel was produced in 2019 and India was the second largest steel producer with its total crude steel production of 111 MT. With its total production of 37 MT in 2019, India is also the largest producer of sponge iron in the world. The steel industry directly contributes slightly more than 2% to the GDP of the country. The indirect contribution is much more. The Indian steel industry employs nearly half a million people directly and about 2 million people indirectly. During 2019–20, India was the net exporter of steel and the total import and export during the year were 7.164 MT and 11.18 MT, respectively, with net export of approximately 4 MT.
India is also the second largest consumer of steel in the world. Demand/consumption of steel has been continuously increasing over the years. At 101.1 MT in 2019–20, Indian steel demand/consumption grew at the rate of1.4% over 2018–19 and by around 5.7% on a CAGR basis during the last five years. Due to Covid 19 pandemic, global crude steel production in 2020 declined in almost all the countries barring China, and the year ended up with only a marginal increase of 0.2% to 1878 MT from 1974 in the previous calendar year. For the same reason, Indian crude steel production also declined very severely, by around 10% to 100 MT. Demand of finished steel also contracted by 13.7% in India during the year. However, future steel scenario appears brighter. World Steel Association (WSA) in its Short Range Outlook of April 2021, forecasts that global finished steel demand will grow by approximately 5.8% in 2021 and further by 2.7% in 2022. India’s finished steel demand is also expected to grow by about 20% to 106 MT in 2021 and further by about 6% to 112 MT in 2022.
Going by the per capita steel consumption of 74kg as against the global average of around 230kg, there is large potential for enhancing India’s steel capacity and production. India’s steelmaking capacity, which at present is 142 MT, is projected to reach 300 MT by 2030–31 as per the National Steel Policy, 2017 of Government of India.
Essentially, steel is an alloy of iron and carbon (normally less than 2%) and other elements including manganese, silicon, etc. (normally less than 1%). Globally, steel is produced via two main process routes, namely the Basic Oxygen Furnace (BOF) route and Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) route. In BOF route, conventionally called primary/integrated route, steel is produced by adopting two stages, namely liquid iron making from iron ore in blast furnace followed by steel making in BOF using liquid iron produced in blast furnace and steel scrap. Of late, some portion of liquid iron is also produced in COREX/FINEX furnaces. In EAF route, the primary raw material is steel scrap with/without DRI produced in-house or purchased from outside sources. Of late, some units have started using hot metal in EAF or modified EAFs known as Con-Arc Furnace. Globally, during 2019, approximately 72% steel was produced through BF-BOF route while the remaining 28% was produced through EAF route.
Post de-licensing and de-regulation in 1991, a large number of Electric Induction Furnaces (EIFs) were set up in India with/without captive DRI, and today, the sector contributes about 30% of total steel production in the country (2019–20). As a result, proportion of BF-BOF route as well as EAF route skewed down to 44% and 26% respectively, and the EIF sector contributed 30% of the total crude steel production. A list of Indian steel producers, route-wise, along with production details are given in Table 1.
Table 1: List of Indian steel producers by route| Process route-wise producers | Production of crude steel (in million tonne) | |
| 2018–19 | 2019–20 | |
| 1.0 Oxygen route (BOF) route | ||
| 1.1 SAIL | 16.045 | 15.946 |
| 1.2 Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd. | 5.233 | 4.749 |
| 1.3 Tata Steel Group | 16.036 | 16.399 |
| 1.4 JSW Steel Ltd. | 10.096 | 9.641 |
| 1.5 Others (BOF) | 2.043 | 1.838 |
| Sub-total | 49.455 (45%) | 48.573 (44%) |
| 2.0 Electric route | ||
| 2.1 Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) Route | ||
| 2.1.1 SAIL | 0.218 | 0.210 |
| 2.1.2 Tata Steel Group | 2.363 | 2.126 |
| 2.1.3 AM/NS( Essar Steel) | 6.813 | 7.121 |
| 2.1.4 JSW Steel Ltd | 6.647 | 6.329 |
| 2.1.5 Jindal Steel & Power Ltd | 5.254 | 5.861 |
| 2.1.6 Lloyds Steel Ltd | 0.518 | 0.495 |
| 2.1.7 Jindal Stainless Ltd | 1.554 | 1.418 |
| 2.1.8 Bhushan Power & Steel Ltd | 2.778 | 2.901 |
| 2.1.9 Other EAFs | 2.331 | 1.906 |
| Sub-total (EAF) | 28.476 (26%) | 28.367 (26%) |
| 2.2 Electric Induction Furnace (EIF) | 32.990 (30%) | 32.198 (30%) |
| Sub-total Electric Route | 61.466 (55%) | 60.564 (56%) |
| Grand total | 110.921 | 109.137 |
Steel is a permanent material that can be infinitely recycled and is 100% recyclable without any loss of quality. All types of steel can be recycled back into new steel of various grades, without losing their inherent properties. Today, there are over 3500 different grades of steel with different physical, chemical, metallurgical properties, and in different shapes and sizes.
Though steel is a clean material, steel making is essentially resource and energy intensive and has its environmental ramifications. According to Energy Statistics 2019, published by Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India, iron and steel is the most energy intensive industrial sector in India accounting for approximately 15% of energy consumption in the sector and 8.4% of total energy consumption in the country in 2017–18. Similarly, iron and steel sector accounts for about 8% of total CO2 emission in the country. On per tonne basis, on average about 25-27 Giga joule (6–6.5 Giga calories) of energy is consumed in India, which is much higher (by about 40–50%) than the global bench mark plants at19–21 Giga joule (4.5-5 Gcal/tcs). CO2 emission intensity per tonne of crude steel produced in India is also much higher (2.5–3tonne)as compared to global average (1.8–1.9 tonne).Table 2 gives acomparative analysis of energy intensity and CO2 emission intensity in Indian integrated steel plants and some of the well-known steel producers abroad.
Table 2:Energy and CO2emissions intensity in Indian and international plants| Indian steel plants(2015–16) | Global steel plants | ||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plants Parameter | JSPLCG | JSWD | RINL | BSL | BSP | DSP | JSWV | RSP | TSL | WSA Ref 2 | Nippon SteelGroup, Japa | JFE Steel, Japa | ArcelorMittal S.A. | ThyssenKrupp, Germany | Bao Steel, China | AN Steel Group, Chi | Tata Steel,Europe | Tata Steel, | Tata Steel, Netherlands |
| Energy Intensity GJ/tcs | 31.43 | 28.84 | 28.42 | 27.58 | 27.37 | 27.25 | 26.75 | 25.95 | 23.70 | 18 | 23.5 | 23.2 | 23.9 | 21.4 | 17.2 (586 kg Stnd. Coal | 16.7 (570Kg Stnd. Coal | 21.2 | 24.2 | 19.8 |
| CO2 Emission Intensity Tonnes/tcs | 3.15 | 2.25 | 2.91 | 2.76 | 2.76 | 2.64 | 2.67 | 2.57 | 2.4 | 1.67 | 2.02 | 2.02 | 2.14 | 2.04 | Not available | Not available | 1.98 | 2.21 | 1.87 |
| 1Ref: Energy Efficiency Summit, 29-30 Aug 2018 www.greenbusinescentre.com | Ref: Corporate Sustainability Reports | ||||||||||||||||||
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The higher energy and CO2 intensity in Indian steel plant are mainly because of technological obsolescence, raw material quality constraints, and lack of large-scale adoption of dedicated energy-efficient best available technologies (BATs). Of late, however, the scenario has been changing as newer steel plants have come up and most of the existing plants have been modernized by adopting latest energy-efficient clean and green technologies. However, the overall position of adoption of energy-efficient technologies is not very satisfactory in Indian steel plants as is visible from Tables 3 and 4.
Table 3:Technology penetration rate at the primary steel producing companies in India as on 2017| Sl.No. | Title of Technology[% adoption(adopted / total locations)] | SAIL | RINL | TATA | ESSAR | JSW | JSPL | Bhushan Steel | Total |
| Sintering | |||||||||
| 1 | Sinter Cooler Waste Heat Recovery - Steam | 0% (0/16) |
0% (0/3) |
0% (0/5) |
0% (0/1) |
62.5% (5/8) |
50% (1/2) |
0% (0/3) |
16% (6/38) |
| 2 | Sinter Cooler Waste Heat Recovery - Power | 0% (0/16) |
67% (2/3) |
0% (0/5) |
0% (0/1) |
25% (1/4) |
0% (0/2) |
0% (0/3) |
9% (3/34) |
| 3 | High Efficiency Burner in Ignition Furnace | 100% (16/16) |
67% (2/3) |
0% (0/5) |
100% (1/1) |
100% (8/8) |
100% (2/2) |
0% (0/3) |
84% (32/38) |
| Coke making | |||||||||
| 4 | Coke Dry Quenching(CDQ) | 9% (3/33) |
100% (4/4) |
55% (5/9) |
0% (0/0) |
80% (4/5) |
0% (0/2) |
100% (2/2) |
32% (18/55) |
| 5 | Coal Moisture Control(CMC) | 0% (0/33) |
0% (0/4) |
0% (0/9) |
0% (0/0) |
0% (0/5) |
0% (0/2) |
0% (2/2) |
0% (0/55) |
| Iron making | |||||||||
| 6 | Top Pressure Recovery Turbine(TRT) | 15.8% (3/19) |
100% (3/3) |
50% (4/8) |
100% (1/1) |
80% (4/5) |
67% (2/3) |
50% (1/2) |
44% (18/55) |
| 7 | Pulverized Coal Injection(PCI) System | 84% (16/19) |
100% (3/3) |
67% (6/8) |
100% (1/1) |
100% (7/7) |
100% (3/3) |
100% (2/2) |
88.3% (38/43) |
| 8 | Hot stove Waste Heat Recovery | 15.8% (3/19) |
33% (1/3) |
50% (4/8) |
100% (1/1) |
100% (7/7) |
100% (3/3) |
50% (1/2) |
46.5% (20/43) |
| Steelmaking | |||||||||
| 9 | Converter Gas Recovery Device | 90% (19/21) |
100% (6/6) |
67% (6/9) |
- | 100% (2/2) |
100% (1/1) |
50% (1/2) |
< 85.4% (35/41+) |
| 10 | Converter Gas Sensible Heat Recovery Device | 0% (0/21) |
0% (0/6) |
0% (0/9) |
- | 0% (0/2) |
0% (0/1) |
0% (0/2) |
0% (0/41+) |
| 11 | Ecological and Economical Arc Furnace | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | N.A. (-/-) |
Table 4: Overall technology adoption status in various units of integrated steel plants in India
Source: Tata Steel Limited.
In so far as secondary steel making through coal-based DRI, EIF, and SRRM (Steel Rerolling Mills) is concerned, these technologies have been adopted in India and a few references are available globally. Accordingly, details of the energy-efficient technologies including their benefits have been sourced based on the Indian benchmarks as practiced by Indian secondary steel sector and compiled bythe UNDP under the Ministry of Steel – UNDP – GEF/Aus Aid steel project: Energy-efficient Technology for Small Scale Steel Sector in India. It is, however, worthwhile to mention here that in the coal-based DRI-EAF/EIF steel plants, energy consumption and CO2 emissions are relatively higher than the primary route, mainly because of higher coal consumption per tonne of metal produced.
Further, new and innovative high performance steel is continuously being developed to minimize the carbon footprint over the lifecycle of products made of steel. The steel industry is also working on many initiatives across the globe to develop breakthrough technologies to minimize CO2 emissions. Today, high efficiency is an integral part of modern steel-making process. This is achieved by following the concept of circular economy with an aim to minimize the amount of material, energy, and other resource consumption, maximizing the use of scrap and also maximizing waste recycling/reuse. Today, most of the byproducts generated during iron/steel making are recycled/reused, barring BOF slag wherein the usage is not upto 100% due to techno-commercial issues. Steel-makers across the globe affirm seven sustainability principles encompassing environmental, social, and economic sustainability which are aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
The Paris Climate Agreement aims to curb the global warming below two degree centigrade above the pre-industrial level and also to pursue efforts to limit the increase in temperature to 1.5 degree centigrade. The Paris Agreement also aims to achieve a balance between GHG generation and its removal into sinks including extraction sequestration of carbon dioxide (CO2). Iron & steel sector significantly contributes to global CO2 emissions accounting for 2.6 Giga tonne annually, 7% of global total emissions from the energy system. It is therefore, apparent that the sector pursues strategies to reduce CO2 emissions consistently. The International Energy Agency (IEA) has conducted a study to explore various options. As per this study, emissions from the steel sector must fall by at-least 50% by 2050, with continuing declines towards zero emissions being pursues thereafter, to meet global emissions and climate goals. Towards this objective, several technologies and strategies including the use of hydrogen for iron and steel production are being explored, to minimize or avoid the use of fossil fuels.