• Preferential access to abundant and affordable clean energy;
• Breakthrough steelmaking technologies to be identified as a key priority area for public funding;
• The necessary renewable energy, hydrogen, and carbon transport and storage infrastructure to be made available at national and regional levels to enable industrial-scale use of such technologies; and
• Materials policies should reward products for their reusability and recyclability to accelerate the transition to a circular economy.
Each of these elements will be critical to speeding up the transition to low-carbon steelmaking, but when it comes to meeting a challenge on a scale as epic as reinventing an industry as big as ours, we should not underestimate the value of having agreement on what good looks like along the way. This is something ResponsibleSteel, the first global multi-stakeholder standard and certification programme for the steel and mining industry – of which ArcelorMittal is a founding member – is examining closely. In fact, the Carbon Disclosure Project, The Climate Group and We Mean Business are all members of ResponsibleSteel and are actively helping shape its carbon standard, which will answer the question of what ‘good’ is while we strive to reach the ultimate objective of low-carbon steelmaking for a low-carbon world.
The carbon question is coming, steel sector. We need to be ready to answer it despite the paradoxes we face. Like all major global challenges, we cannot solve it alone. We need governments at all levels, NGOs, our customers and the public to help us get there, so let’s get the word out to our stakeholders that we want to make carbon-free steel and tell them how they can help us achieve it.
So yes, technology and innovation are essential to find ways of making steel with less carbon, but we also need understanding, trust and support from key stakeholders. Our carbon report has helped change the conversation with our key stakeholders and the ResponsibleSteel programme is a good way of turning that conversation into a market-facing standard. So yes, to conversation too. I hope many of you, our customers and other steel companies join us in this conversation. We cannot do this alone.