Steel Industry News

A feasibility study has highlighted the potential for using clean ammonia to refuel ships, particularly iron ore carriers, visiting the Pilbara region of Western Australia.The study, commissioned by Yara Clean Ammonia (Yara) and Pilbara Ports, was undertaken by Lloyd's Register, and looked at key areas including the estimated demand and likely availability of ammonia as a replacement shipping fuel. The potential risks and regulatory requirements for ammonia bunkering at the ports…

The Sustainable Shipping Initiative (SSI) has published a green steel and shipping report calling for circularity in shipbuilding. Steel is the primary shipbuilding material, making over 75% of a vessel by weight, and the steel industry is responsible for 7-9% of global GHG emissions. Addressing steel emissions is critical to decarbonizing across the ship lifecycle, says SSI, and provides opportunities for collaboration with the steel sector and other steel demand sectors. The report identified drivers and barriers to closing the loop on steel in shipping…

“Having narrowly avoided a recession in the fourth quarter of 2022, the Japanese economy appears to be recovering. However, Japan’s demand for steel remains weak and as a result, the country’s bulk imports are estimated to have fallen by 4% y/y in the first quarter of 2023,” says Filipe Gouveia, Shipping Analyst at BIMCO.The steel industry in Japan relies on iron ore and coking coal imports, which combined account for 41% of the country’s bulk imports. Due to lower steel production in Japan…

Samson, a Wind River Holdings company, entered into a purchase agreement with Folch Ropes, S.A. For 144 years, Samson has been a leader in the development and manufacture of high-performance ropes. Samson is headquartered are in Ferndale, Washington.Folch Ropes is a Spanish manufacturing company headquartered in Llinars del Vallès Barcelona. Folch began manufacturing braided ropes for the steel industry in 1942 and has enjoyed four generations of family ownership.Both companies have had a long history of success in the rope business with strong brands and are aligned with operational excellence and manufacturing quality products, including ISO 9001: 2015 certifications.

Stena Line says that it has decreased the carbon emissions by 11% per ton of cargo carried over each nautical mile, plus a reduction of 4% total ship emissions compared to pre-Covid operations. According to the company, the main contributor is the higher utilization of its fleet with cargo during the latest years. Also, during port operations and lay times, Stena Line says that it now uses 100% renewable electricity. The energy is used for shore power at 20% of Stena Line´s terminals while berthing…

The volume of total cargo throughput in the port of Rotterdam was 0.8% higher in the first half of the year (233.5 million tonnes) than in the same period in 2021 (231.6 million tonnes). In many segments, the war in Ukraine led to significant changes. For example, imports of both LNG and coal rose very sharply as an alternative to reduced European imports of Russian gas by pipeline. The throughput of crude oil increased, with oil products falling off. Throughput of iron ore, agricultural…

Edward Heerema is founder and president of Allseas, which brought the world’s largest construction vessel, Pioneering Spirit, to the market. The company, which also brought innovation to the pipelay sector, has added its latest trick to Pioneering Spirit – its jacket lift system. But Allseas is also targeting deepsea mining and has its sights on the offshore wind market. Elaine Maslin caught up with Edward Heerema to find out more.The first time I met Edward Heerema was at the company’s offices in Delft, in the Netherlands.

The Metals Company (TMC), a company extracting battery metals from seafloor polymetallic nodules, said Friday its subsidiary NORI had signed a non-binding term sheet with its strategic partner and shareholder, Allseas to develop and operate a commercial nodule collection system. The system has a targeted production capacity of 1.3 million tonnes per year of wet nodules and expected production readiness by Q4 2024.According to TMC, formerly knowns as DeepGreen Metals, polymetallic nodules contain high grades of nickel…

Marvin Ferguson, Commissioner for the Ports of Indiana (POI) from 1993 – 2018, has passed away. First appointed by Governor Evan Bayh in 1993, Ferguson was the longest-serving Commissioner in the Ports’ history, having served under six different Governors (Bayh, O’Bannon, Kernan, Daniels, Pence and Holcomb). “Marvin has a great legacy with the Ports of Indiana,” said Ports of Indiana chief executive officer Vanta E. Coda, II. “I often talk of the foundation that I was handed when taking my current role. Marvin was a huge builder of that foundation.

In 2015 Stena Line converted the 240-m Stena Germanica to become the world’s first methanol powered ferry. Fast forward six years and the Swedish ferry company has achieved another world first, powering Stena Germanica with methanol recycled from residual steel gases powering the ship this week on its trip from Sweden to Germany.Dubbed ‘Blue Methanol’, the fuel is recycled from residual steel gases, a by product of the steel production industry and helps reduce the ferry’s reliance on diesel."It is exciting to be part of our sustainable journey and try out another new sustainable fuel.

The Baltic Exchange's main sea freight index tracking rates for ships ferrying dry bulk commodities scaled an over one-year peak on Monday, propelled by higher rates across vessel segments, with panamax rates touching an over 10-year high.The Baltic dry index, which tracks rates for capesize, panamax and supramax vessels, rose 38 points, or 1.7%, to 2,319, its highest since September 2019.The capesize index advanced 38 points, or 1.6%, to 2,382.Average daily earnings for capesizes, which typically transport 150,000-tonne cargoes such as coal and steel-making ingredient iron ore, rose $314 to $

In the first two months of 2021, Brazilian iron ore exports have risen by 9.1% to 53 million tonnes, driven by China. So far this year, 35.2 million tonnes of iron ore has been exported to China, representing a 15.2% increase from the same period last year and standing in contrast to slightly declining exports to all other countries: down 1.2% to 17.8 million tonnes, continuing the trend from 2020.Despite the strong growth rates in the first months of this year, total exports of iron ore have failed to recover to 2019 levels following the 21.8% drop in volumes in 2020.

The United States on Tuesday blacklisted a Chinese company that makes elements for steel production, 12 Iranian steel and metals makers and three foreign-based sales agents of a major Iranian metals and mining holding company, seeking to deprive Iran of revenues as U.S. President Donald Trump's term winds down.In a statement, the U.S. Treasury Department named the China-based company as Kaifeng Pingmei New Carbon Materials Technology Co Ltd.

A  recently completed a $2 million capital improvement project aims to attract more cargo to one of the nation’s largest inland ports.Situated 153 miles from the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, the Port of Indiana-Mount Vernon connects the Ohio River Valley region’s agriculture, coal and manufacturing industries to the rest of the world via year-round access to the Gulf of Mexico and Great Lakes through the inland waterways system.Each year, more than 3,600 barges…

Switzerland criticized on Thursday measures the European Union has adopted to curb steel imports amid a global trade spat, saying they harmed the Swiss steel industry.The European Commission last month revised safeguard measures introduced in July 2018 and decided to reduce the annual increase in quota volumes, the government said in a summary of talks on the status of a bilateral free trade deal. "These changes threaten to further restrict bilateral steel trade between Switzerland and the EU and harm the Swiss steel industry…

Armed Polish border guards boarded a Greenpeace ship blocking a delivery of coal in the port of Gdansk late on Monday and detained two activists, officials said on Tuesday.The environmental group said it staged the protest to highlight Poland's continued dependence on air-polluting coal and to pressure it to phase out coal as a source of energy by 2030.Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior arrived in Gdansk at 1600 GMT on Monday and the ship anchored around midnight, trying to prevent a shipment of coal from Mozambique from being unloaded…

Shipments of iron ore on the Great Lakes totaled 5.7 million tons in June, a decrease of 5.7 percent from 2018. Shipments were, however, nearly even with the month’s 5-year average, said a release from Lake Carriers’ Association.Year-to-date the iron ore trade stands at 20.19 million tons, almost matching the previous year’s total of 20.15 million tons.Iron shipments are ahead of their 5-year average for the first half of the year. Loadings have increased more than 840,000 tons.Lake…

A consortium of 11 European stakeholders including ArcelorMittal, Axens, IFP Energies nouvelles (IFPEN) and Total, launched a project to demonstrate an innovative process for capturing CO2 from industrial activities named the DMX project.It is part of a more comprehensive study dedicated to the development of the future European Dunkirk North Sea capture and storage cluster.The “3D” project (for DMXTM Demonstration in Dunkirk) is part of Horizon 2020, the European Union’s research and innovation program.The project has a 19.3 million euro budget over 4 years, including 14.8 million euros in European Union subsidies. Coordinated by IFPEN…

Bill now heads to White House for President Trump’s signature.Today, the Senate voted 99-1 in favor of America’s Water Infrastructure Act of 2018/Water Resources Development Act, otherwise known as WRDA 2018. The Bill passed in the U.S. House by unanimous voice vote (435-0) in August.“The passage of WRDA 2018 is a win for the Nation’s towboat operators, freight shippers, ports and labor and conservation groups that rely on an efficient inland waterways system,” said Mike Toohey, President and CEO of the Waterways Council, Inc. (WCI).

Port of Cleveland President & CEO and newly elected Board Chairman of the American Association of Port Authorities William Friedman weighs in this month on the Port of Cleveland and its role in the all important Great Lakes trades.When the American Association of Port Authorities (AAPA) announced the election of Port of Cleveland President and CEO, William D. Friedman, to serve as chairman for the 2018-19 year, beginning this October, it was perhaps a conscious decision to tap someone who has a broad range of experience and skills in myriad ports, large and small. That’s Friedman in a nutshell. AAPA represents 140 of the leading maritime port authorities in this hemisphere. If you’ve seen one port; well, you’ve seen one port.

Finnish dry bulker ESL ShippingLtd, a shipping company fully owned by Aspo Group, is going to acquire all the outstanding shares of AtoB@C Shipping AB and AtoB@C Holding AB (AtoB@C) that offer shipping services. The enterprise value is EUR 30 million. The final purchase price will be mainly financed by Aspo's existing financing reserves, and approximately EUR 4.2 million will be covered by new shares issued by Aspo Plc. The transaction will require the competition authority's approval in Finland to be completed. It is estimated that the transaction will be completed in the third quarter of 2018. AtoB@C is engaged in the shipping business with 30 vessels in size of 4,000-5,000 tonnes. AtoB@C owns six dry cargo vessels in full, and it has a share of 49% of two vessels.

China will shut down more outdated steel plants and bring total capacity to less than 1 billion tonnes by 2025, the president of the country's steel industry association said, adding that national demand for the metal is set to decline gradually. With more than three quarters of firms suffering losses as a result of a price-sapping capacity surplus, China vowed in early 2016 to shut 150-150 million tonnes of annual production in five years in a bid to raise profitability and utilisation rates in the sector. Its capacity then was estimated at 1.2 billion tonnes.

U.S. President Donald Trump announced on Thursday he would impose tariffs of 25 percent on imported steel and 10 percent on aluminum, in a move the administration said would protect U.S. industry, but which critics said would fail to boost jobs and risked stoking a trade war with China. Trump, speaking after a meeting with U.S. steel and aluminum makers said the duties would be formally announced next week. “We’re going to build our steel industry back and our aluminum industry back," he said. News of the tariffs drove the stocks of U.S.