New Zealand Steel has announced plans to build a new electric arc furnace (EAF) at its Glenbrook steelworks in the Auckland region.
The new EAF will replace the steelmaker’s existing oxygen steelmaking furnace and two of the four coal-fueled kilns, it said on 22 May. The Glenbrook steel mill produces around 670,000 t/yr, according to the firm’s website. The project will take place over the next three years and is aimed at lowering the company’s carbon emissions. It will cost NZ$300mn ($187mn), of which the New Zealand government will contribute NZ$140mn.
Several other steelmakers in the Asia-Pacific region have also committed to new EAF capacities. Japan’s largest steelmaker Nippon Steel said earlier this month that it started a study to accelerate the company’s decarbonisation progress by replacing its basic oxygen furnaces with EAFs. Taiwan’s Dragon Steel — a wholly-owned subsidiary of state-owned China Steel — also in March announced plans to build a new 1.5mn t/yr EAF by 2030.
New Zealand is one of the major ferrous scrap exporters in the Asia-Pacific region. It exported 536,000t of steel scrap in 2022.