Low-carbon development strategy analysis of the domestic and foreign steel industry

In an era of green and low-carbon development, the global steel industry has conducted low-carbon research, and various low-carbon technologies have continuously emerged. This paper summarizes the CO₂ emission status of the global steel industry and international steel enterprises, such as ArcelorMittal, Nippon Steel, POSCO, and Big River Steel, and summarizes the carbon emission reduction targets and low-carbon development projects of major steel-producing countries, such as the United States and Japan. Based on this, the low-carbon strategy is analyzed in detail, noting that the low-carbon development direction of the international iron and steel industry is mainly focused on developing electric furnace processes, hydrogen metallurgy technology, carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) technology, and clean energy utilization. In addition, the EU is actively building a carbon emission trading system and achieving carbon reduction using policies and regulations such as a carbon tax and carbon border tax. After analyzing the low-carbon development situation of the international steel industry, this paper focuses on the low-carbon green development of the domestic steel industry. Firstly, combined with the total output of crude steel, total CO₂ emissions, CO₂ emissions per ton of steel, and other data of China’s iron and steel industry, this paper analyzes the status quo of carbon emissions in China’s iron and steel industry. Secondly, it summarizes the carbon emission reduction targets of Baosteel, HBIS, and other large state-owned iron and steel enterprises. Thirdly, the countermeasures for China’s steel industry to achieve a “carbon peak and carbon neutrality” are summarized as follows: implement crude steel output control, adjust the production process structure, conduct research and development of low-carbon energy-saving technology, and build a carbon trading system; among them, reduction development and process structure adjustment are the main future directions of low-carbon development of China’s iron and steel industry, while low-carbon energy-saving technology and a carbon trading system are important guarantees for China’s iron and steel industry to achieve carbon neutrality. Finally, to make the four macro strategies proposed above more specific and visualized, a typical steel enterprise in China is selected based on its technical characteristics, geographical location, resource endowment, and development planning. Seven emission reduction paths, including iron resource optimization, process optimization and reconstruction, system energy efficiency improvement, energy consumption structure optimization, low-carbon technology transformation, industrial coordination, and carbon reduction management enhancement, are analyzed and proposed to point out the direction of green and low-carbon development for the enterprise.