ISRI provides comments on China’s ferrous standards

Earlier this year, the Standardization Administration of China (SAC) published a draft of its Guobiao Standards (GB/T). The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI), Washington, has announced that it has submitted comments to the Chinese government regarding its draft GB/T standards for recycled steel raw materials. The standard was proposed by the China Iron and Steel Association (CISA) and is under the jurisdiction of the National Pig Iron and Ferroalloy Standardization Technical Committee.

In the association’s comments, ISRI commends China for developing proposed standards for imports of recycled steel raw materials. ISRI also suggests China provide more clarity on recycling operations as well as aligning the Chinese standards codes with ISRI specification codes to ensure proper compliance with the regulations set in the draft standards.

In addition, ISRI has advised China to update the draft GB/T standards for recycled steel raw materials to include a better definition of the word “shredding.”

“‘Crushing’ and ‘shredding’ are very different operations; ‘crushing’ does not adequately explain ‘shredding,’” ISRI states. “We recommend the following explanation of shredding: A highly mechanized process of fragmentizing automobiles, appliances, scrap steel and other large recyclable materials into smaller, usable recycled commodities.”

ISRI reports that it has also provided China with comments regarding the draft GB/T standards related to processing methods diagrammed. The standards use the term “wool” to describe the first stage of processing methods. ISRI says, “This is not a common term in the global steel industry and causes confusion as to what are acceptable starting points for ‘recycled steel raw materials.’ We recommend using the term ‘steel scrap.’”