While Europe chastises the USA for not signing up to the Kyoto Protocol to limit CO2 emissions, the US argues that – taking carbon sinks into the equation – Europe is a bigger emitter of carbon dioxide than USA. There is also increasing skepticism over the part played by carbon dioxide in global warming. In August 2000, NASA scientist James Hansen – father of the modern global warming debate – backed away from the notion that CO2 is the principal culprit in climate change, suggesting instead that methane and soot might have greater responsibility. Whatever the science, the reality is that public perception believes heavy industry to be the main cause – ignoring the outpourings of their own automobiles. This article reports on Eurofer's views on CO2 emissions and how they are attempting to influence political decisions.
The steel industry in the European Union employs directly about 280 000 persons and produces about 160 million tonnes of crude steel per year, which represents more than 20 percent of world production. The steel industry operates in a highly competitive environment on a global market, where rigorous cost management is imperative for maintaining and strengthening the industry’s competitiveness. For this reason, European steel producers have a tradition of developing new processes to reduce energy and raw material consumption. Steelmaking processes have been developed and refined during a very long time. Today’s processes are large-scale and highly efficient in terms of energy and raw material use. The European steel industry has come far on the experience curve, resulting in high and growing marginal costs for further improvements. Steelmaking is capital intensive and the average plant life is very long, which makes changes to new technologies possible only in a timeframe of several decades.