Oryx says scrap is improving stainless steel’s carbon footprint
Source: https://www.recyclingtoday.com/news/oryx-stainless-steel-recycling-lower-carbon-footprint/
Author: Brian Taylor
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. 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.”