Japan's mills launch joint project to develop hydrogen use

Japan's three integrated mills, Nippon Steel, JFE Steel and Kobe Steel with Japan Research and Development Center for Metals, have officially launched a joint project with the government funding to develop hydrogen utilization in iron and steelmaking process, the companies announced on June 15.

The three integrated mills will collaborate and develop advanced technologies in hydrogen utilization in iron and steelmaking process to decarbonize the steel industry, which emits a large amount of CO2 during production, with a maximum funding of Yen 193.5 billion ($1.44 billion) from the government's green innovation projects.

The project includes two key themes - "development of hydrogen reduction technology using a blast furnace" and "development of direct hydrogen reduction technology for low-grade iron ore."

Each mill has made detailed plans for the project - Nippon Steel started testing its remodeled No.2 blast furnace at Kimitsu area of East Nippon Works near Tokyo last month, and JFE Steel is to build a small-sized blast furnace (about 150 cu m) at Chiba area of East Japan Works and aims to start testing in April 2025.

The companies will also install a new small-sized electric arc furnace (EAF), or to remodel the existing EAFs to remove impurities by using direct-reduced iron and to produce high-quality steel of the same level as those produced through blast furnaces. It will be slated for testing sometime between 2022 and 2024.

A Nippon Steel official explained that the three companies have been investing and developing advanced technologies in steelmaking process, but the costs have been very high. So the new project backed by the Japanese government will accelerate their pace of development.

"We would like to try and bring forward the schedule as early as possible, so as to achieve our goal of 30% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2030," she emphasized.

Written by Yoko Manabe, yoko.manabe@mysteel.com

Note: This article has been published in accordance with an article exchange agreement between Mysteel Global and SteelMint.