Oryx says scrap is improving stainless steel’s carbon footprint

Netherlands-based stainless steel processing and trading firm Oryx Stainless Group says research it is conducting with Germany’s Fraunhofer UMSICHT institute has determined there was “a savings potential of more than 4.5 tons of CO₂” emissions per ton of blended scrap prepared by Oryx Stainless Group and used at melt shops.

“More recent calculations by the UMSICHT team even come to savings of over 6.7 tons of CO₂ equivalent per ton of blend for the reference year 2021,” Oryx says, adding, “The results show: The recycling of stainless steel scrap has great potential to save greenhouse gases.

“As the demand for stainless steel continues to rise, a responsible and efficient use of limited global resources is becoming increasingly important. One option for steelmakers to save greenhouse gases is to produce new stainless steel from high-quality secondary raw material blends instead of primary raw materials.”

Oryx points to its melt shop-specific blends of scrap as particularly helpful, noting, "Secondary raw materials are upgraded by combining differently alloyed stainless steel scrap to produce blends. These blends, being in accordance with the technical specifications needed, are used in steel mills as the main inputs in an electric arc furnace (EAF) process.”

For the research project, the Fraunhofer UMSICHT researchers studied the use of scrap blends made at Oryx sites in Dordrecht, Netherlands, and Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany. The institute conducted studies at the two sites both in 2009 and 2021. “The results show [that] greenhouse gas savings continue to increase,” Oryx says.

The company says a corresponding study for its site in Thailand is in progress at UMSICHT.

The institute has calculated stainless steel CO₂ emissions savings of more than 3 million tons in the 2021 study, approximately one million metric tons CO₂ equivalent more than in 2009.

“In order to be able to compare the values meaningfully and reliably with our earlier calculations, we have also recalculated the data for 2009 again with our new model,” says Dr. Daniel Maga of Fraunhofer UMSICHT. “Among other things, the most recent data sets for the raw materials of primary steel production show a higher carbon footprint and the current electricity mix for 2020 shows a lower CO₂ footprint.”

To compute the comparative results, the researchers first calculated the total greenhouse gas savings from substituting primary material in the electric arc furnace (EAF) process. In a second step, they considered the entire Oryx process chain for the sites in Mülheim an der Ruhr and Dordrecht, from collection to production of the finished blends to their transport to the customers.

“The results help us to quantify and communicate the benefits of stainless steel production from [scrap] blends,” Oryx CEO Tobias Kämmer says. “The findings also form a basis for political decisions and strategic planning.”