MUSCAT: In a major boost for Oman’s emerging green steel industry, a leading steel mill in the Czech Republic has signed an agreement to procure around 1 million tonnes of low-carbon steel from a first-ever green steel project currently in the early stages of development in the Special Economic Zone at Duqm (SEZAD).
Vítkovice Steel, based in the Czech region of Ostrava, is reported to have signed a ‘Memorandum of Cooperation’ with Vulcan Green Steel, which is constructing a 5 million tonnes per annum capacity steel mill powered primarily by green hydrogen and other renewable energy sources. Total investment in the Duqm venture, backed by Indian power and steel conglomerate Jindal Group, is about $3 billion.
The announcement came in a report published by Ocelarska Unie, an association of Czech and Slovak steel producers. It quoted Radek Strouhal, CEO of Vitkovice Steel, as saying that the deal will position the steelmaker among the first European producers of low-carbon steel products.
"Acquiring a new supplier of input material produced with state-of-the-art technology is a breakthrough strategic step that will allow us to produce and supply to the market quality sheets, sheet plates and billets from ecological steel," said Radek Strouhal.
“We should to become one of the first producers of so-called green sheets in Europe and thus strengthen competitiveness and its position on the markets. We reserved 1 million tonnes per year through the memorandum. We have not yet achieved such a volume of production, this year we would like to produce approximately 600,000 tonnes, but this is our goal in the coming years," he added.
A leading European manufacturer of heavy steel slabs, Vitkovice’s steel products are used in a wide range of industries, including construction, energy, transportation, and engineering. A pair of company-owned mills in Ostrava convert these slabs into heavy plates, shaped cutouts and sheet pilings used as parts of major bridges, building structures and high-performance machines.
The binding MoC commits Vulcan Green Steel to supplying low-carbon steel plates of thicknesses ranging from 230mm to 300mm at prices to be decided under separate agreements, according to the Czech company.
Following the closure of its own steel mill in 2015, the company has been scouring overseas markets for steel slabs to be fashioned into engineering and construction hardware for its domestic and European customers. Vulcan Green Steel, with its commitment to produce steel with a carbon footprint of less than 0.6-0.7 tonnes of CO₂ per tonne of crude steel, will go a long way in satisfying its input requirements, it pointed out.
Last November, Vulcan Green Steel broke ground on an integrated steel mill featuring two production lines of 2.5 million metric tonnes per year each, comprising direct reduction iron (DRI), an electric arc furnace (EAF) and a hot strip mill. The project will initially be powered by natural gas but later transition to green hydrogen to produce low carbon steel suited for the automobile, wind turbine and consumer durable goods manufacturing industries in Europe and Japan. First production of green steel is slated during 2027.
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