Northwest Indiana is the nation’s largest steelmaking region, said Gary Councilwoman Lori Latham, D-1st, and area environmental advocates are encouraging U.S. Steel to reduce its carbon footprint.
Gary Advocates for Responsible Development on Saturday hosted its first sustainability conference, Growing Gary Green. The conference featured various environmental topics, including green steel and the future of steelmaking in the city.
Green steel is a crude steel product that’s made using a process that emits significantly less carbon dioxide than traditional steelmaking, said Elizabeth Boatman, consultant for 5 Lakes Energy, an organization that helps achieve clean-energy solutions.
U.S. Steel has two sustainable steels: InduX and verdeX. Both are produced at its Big River Steel facility in Arkansas and are manufactured with up to 75% fewer emissions, 90% recycled content and “are endlessly recyclable without degradation,” according to a statement from U.S. Steel.
The steel company is aiming to meet a net-zero greenhouse gas emissions goal by 2050 and is the first North American steel company to join ResponsibleSteel, a global nonprofit working to make steel more sustainable, according to U.S. Steel. It also has partnerships with the U.S. Department of Energy, CarbonFree, Dell Technologies and Entergy.
“Our goals are ambitious and long-term, and we will work to pursue them in a way that benefits our people and the places where we live and work,” the statement said.
Jack Weinberg, environmental health and development analyst for GARD, is worried that U.S. Steel will leave Gary once green steel is more common.
“We’ve endured it for 115 years,” Weinberg said. “Now, we want the green industry to be here.”
Blast furnaces are typically used in steel production, which use a coal product for heating and the chemical reaction. The furnace releases large amounts of carbon dioxide and toxic chemicals into the environment, and it is the most polluting technology in the process, according to GARD.
“There’s no such thing as a clean blast furnace,” Weinberg said. “They’ll be replaced for environmental reasons, and they’ll be replaced for environmental reasons. They’re all going to be replaced.”
If a deal between Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel goes through, the Japanese company plans to invest $300 million into the Gary Works facility’s blast furnace, which will allow for higher steel production and reduced emissions. With the investment, the Gary Works furnace should have its life extended by up to 20 years.
Direct reduction furnaces are a more environmentally and economically friendly alternative, according to GARD. The furnaces use natural gas and could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by half.
Direct reduction could also use 100% green hydrogen, which could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 90% and create a pathway to zero carbon emissions, according to GARD. The organization also said the process is less costly and more energy efficient.
The furnaces can use strictly hydrogen, Boatman said, adding that blending hydrogen into a blast furnace doesn’t create green steel.
“We can use electricity to split water into oxygen and hydrogen, capture that hydrogen at about a 99.999% purity level and feed that into a direct reduction furnace,” she said.
Indiana is part of The Midwest Alliance for Clean Hydrogen (MachH2) hub, Boatman said, and energy firms BP and NiSource, steelmaker Cleveland-Cliffs and Purdue University Northwest are partners. The hub will create blue hydrogen, when natural gas undergoes a process of steam methane reforming, but it produces methane emissions as a byproduct.
Terry Steagall, a retired member of United Steelworkers 1010, said MachH2 and blue hydrogen are a continuation of fossil fuels and carbon capture.
Steagall believes green hydrogen makes more sense to use as it uses renewable energy sources to split water.
“We’re in kind of a unique situation here in northwest Indiana,” Steagall said. “We have Lake Michigan that provides a good source of water, and we have a lot of renewable energy that people don’t realize is in Indiana.”
MachH2 has multiple clean energy plans to produce clean energy in the Midwest, a spokesperson from the hub said in an email. The project, which also includes carbon sequestration, will result in the avoidance of more than 3.9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent each year, the statement said.
The hub has completed town halls, focus groups and project-specific facilitated sessions, the statement said.
“We realize mutual success requires building relationships and accountability with community, labor, tribal and other stakeholder groups across project areas,” the statement said. “Since application submission, MachH2 continues to focus on comprehensive social characterization assessments and identifying all relevant stakeholders across our potential project locations. … We are also developing hub-wide accountability mechanisms and processes, to ensure that each of our projects include all relevant and diverse stakeholders in their decision-making.”