Decarbonization in the steel industry creating two-tiered iron ore market

  • Wednesday, May 15, 2024
  • Source:ferro-alloys.com

  • Keywords:Decarbonization, steel industry, iron ore market
[Fellow]The iron ore market is expected to diverge into two segments in line with the steelmaking industry’s march toward reducing carbon emissions...
[Ferro-Alloys.comThe iron ore market is expected to diverge into two segments in line with the steelmaking industry’s march toward reducing carbon emissions, it's learned at the 2024 Singapore Iron Ore Forum (SIOF) on Tuesday May 7.
 
Eduardo de Mello Franco, Marketing Manager of iron ore pricing at Vale said that structural undersupply of high-grade iron ore, which is projected to tip 70 million tonnes by 2030, is expected to drive a wedge between mid-grade iron ore sinter fines and high-grade iron ore.
 
Franco added that the expansion of carbon neutral steelmaking feedstocks like direct reduced iron (DRI) in response to the establishment of more rigorous carbon reporting and pricing is expected to put a strong premium on specialized ores that help to reduce emissions vis a vis other mid-grade ores.
 
Speaking in the high-grade iron ore panel at the SIOF, Renato Hendrikson, head of strategic marketing at Samarco said that the fundamental tightness high-grade iron ore supply amid the expansion of global DRI production capacity necessitates a differentiated pricing approach compared with direct shipping ores (DSO).
 
EAF steelmaking with the use of DRI paves the way for a less carbon intensive form of steelmaking, offering a scalable solution for steelmakers to directly reduce carbon output, according to Siddarth Aggarwal, manager and book owner at Anglo American.
 
The opportunity cost of lower metallurgical coal consumption should also be used in differentiating high-grade iron ore with DSO, according to Russell Wescombe, Senior Business Manager at Grange Resources.
 
Wescombe added that the increased regulatory scrutiny on carbon-intensive production methods like iron ore sintering with DSO is expected to incur additional costs in the coming years, incentivizing a pivot toward lower-carbon raw materials.
  • [Editor:kangmingfei]

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