As the world’s leading steel company, we are committed to leading our industry’s efforts to decarbonise, and to be part of the solution to the world reaching net-zero by 2050. In addition to our 2050 net-zero target, we have recently set a Group target of reducing our CO2e emissions intensity by 25% by 2030, and in our European operations, by 35% by 2030. These targets are deliberately the most ambitious of any steelmaker, reflecting our intent to drive meaningful decarbonisation progress this decade.

“If the world is to achieve net-zero by 2050, it will require all parts of the world to contribute. As the world’s leading steel company, we believe we have a responsibility to lead the efforts to decarbonise the steelmaking process.” - Aditya Mittal, CEO, ArcelorMittal

The assumptions on which our targets are based

The targets we have set are based on a number of assumptions:

  1. The cost of green hydrogen will become increasingly competitive over the next decade but will still require government support
  2. Carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) infrastructure will take time to be built at scale. While Europe is expected to take the lead, CCUS infrastructure has the potential to expand quickly in the US and Canada – providing some potential upside to our assumptions
  3. Different regions of the world will continue to move at very different paces and the level of climate ambition will differ between jurisdictions at any given time
  4. The introduction of climate-friendly policies in other regions will be 5-10 years behind Europe
  5. As it has been reported, 2060 may not be a realistic net-zero target for developing economies, which may mean emissions do not peak until 2030
solar farm in a desert

The five levers to net-zero

Our roadmap features five 'levers' (groupings of actions and initiatives) that act as stepping stones to achieving carbon-neutrality by 2050:

In the coming decades, the steel industry will undergo a transformation of the assets used to make steel on a scale not seen for over 100 years. This includes switching steelmaking from the BF-BOF (Blast Furnace-Basic Oxygen Furnace) route to the DRI-EAF (Direct Reduced Iron-Electric Arc Furnace) route. Historically there has been limited use of the DRI-EAF route other than in regions with a very low natural gas price. However, given the increasing cost of carbon and the requirement to reduce emissions, transitioning to natural-gas based DRI-EAF can be a first step with a proven technology that has the potential to further innovate and decarbonise through the use of green hydrogen.

Over recent decades, the steel industry has made enormous efficiency improvements in the efficient use of energy in BF-BOF steelmaking via multiple technologies. Further innovations continue to evolve which reduce CO2 emissions, such as the use of coke oven gas in the tuyeres of the blast furnace, drawing on the rich hydrogen content of the gas. However, these innovations continue to rely significantly on the use of fossil fuels. The energy used to make steel in future years will undergo a further and more radical transition of the industry to clean energy in the form of clean electricity (such as green hydrogen), continued use of fossil carbon coupled with Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) to ensure no carbon is emitted, and use of circular carbon either through natural (sustainable forestry and agriculture residues ) or synthetic (waste plastics) carbon.

As well as using scrap in the EAF, we can increase the use of low-quality scrap in BF-BOF steelmaking process by improving steel scrap sorting and classification and installing scrap pre-melting technology.

Reducing our scope 2 emissions means mainly focusing on sourcing low-carbon electricity. This will be an increasing challenge for ArcelorMittal as we launch projects to transition from BF-BOF technology to scrap and DRI-EAF technology, which will result in electricity becoming a greater part of the energy mix we use to make steel. We intend to focus on purchasing renewable energy certificates and by establishing direct power purchase agreements (PPA) with suppliers from renewables projects.

While ArcelorMittal is committed to achieving net zero by reducing CO2e emissions to the atmosphere from its operations, there are likely to remain residual emissions for which either there will be no feasible technological solution or the solution involves excessively high economic or social costs. For these residual emissions – today we estimate less than 5% of total emissions – ArcelorMittal will buy high-quality offsets or launch projects to generate high-quality carbon credits that would not have happened without the company’s intervention.

Our decarbonisation roadmap 

The 2030-2050 waterfall chart displayed above is for illustrative purposes only - Climate Action Report 2 (2021)