XCarb™, launched in March 2021, is a historic step in ArcelorMittal Europe’s decarbonisation strategy. XCarb™ will ultimately bring together all of ArcelorMittal’s reduced, low, and zero-carbon products and steelmaking activities, as well as wider initiatives and green innovation projects, into a single effort focussed on achieving demonstrable progress towards carbon-neutral steel. The wheels in motion to accelerate the transition to carbon-neutral steelmaking are not just churning internally – ArcelorMittal Europe’s many partners are a valuable part of this ambitious plan.

XCarb™ green steel certificates: an integral element

For ArcelorMittal Europe – Flat Products’ customers, XCarb™ green steel certificates are an integral element of XCarb™. The certificates help customers reduce their Scope 3 emissions, the indirect emissions from sources outside a company’s control.

According to ArcelorMittal Europe CEO Geert Van Poelvoorde, “the reception since the launch has been very positive, with customers buying green steel certificates from a range of countries and industries. I am very proud of the work done by the many teams involved in developing the technology and running the installations that are already contributing to reduced CO2 emissions which, in turn, are translated into green steel certificates that customers can buy alongside their order of physical steel.”

In 2021, approximately 120 000 tonnes of certificates will be available. The initial CO2 savings will be achieved using proven technologies such as replacing the use of coal with the injection of hydrogen-rich gases into the blast furnace.

Further state-of-the-art projects, such as the Carbalyst® project in Ghent that will capture waste gases and biologically convert them into recycled carbon ethanol, are under construction. These projects will allow for more and more green steel certificates to become available. It is expected that 600 000 tonnes worth of green steel certificates will be obtainable in 2022.

What do ArcelorMittal Europe’s partners have to say about XCarb™ green steel certificates?

Ateliers 3S is proud to benefit from XCarb™ green steel certificates
“Ateliers 3S is proud to be the first customer to benefit from ArcelorMittal’s XCarb™ green steel certificates. Design and innovation in building with steel have been the key pillars of the first decade of our business. Today, the environment and sustainable development are at the heart of Ateliers 3S’ concerns. The XCarb™ green steel certificate allows us to report a reduction in our Scope 3 CO2 emissions, something that has never been seen in our sector. They represent an important step forward on Ateliers 3S’ road to carbon neutrality.” (Julien Faisandier, CEO of Ateliers 3S, and Jean Christophe Vigouroux, owner of Ateliers 3S.)

A culture of responsibility sees BILKA purchase XCarb™ green steel certificates
ArcelorMittal’s XCarb™ green steel certificates will allow BILKA to report an equivalent reduction in its Scope 3 emissions, in accordance with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. “We will pass those CO2 savings onto our customers and to the end user. The XCarb™ green steel certificates will help us achieve our target of reducing CO2 emissions and provide a big competitive advantage for the business.” (Horatiu Tepes, owner and CEO of BILKA.)

Text:
ArcelorMittal Europe Communications
Constructalia

Images:
ArcelorMittal
Ateliers 3S
BILKA

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed on 13 July 2021 between ArcelorMittal and the Spanish government demonstrates mutual intent to work together towards a decarbonised Spanish economy – a necessity for industries such as steel to successfully transition to carbon neutrality. As a result, new manufacturing processes at ArcelorMittal’s Spanish operations will include a new direct reduced iron (DRI) unit and electric arc furnace (EAF) installation in Gijón that will reduce carbon emissions at ArcelorMittal’s Spanish operations by approximately 50%. The DRI installation in Gijón will also enable ArcelorMittal Sestao to become the world’s first full-scale zero carbon emissions* steel plant.

ArcelorMittal signs MoU with the Spanish Government supporting €1 billion investment in decarbonisation technologies

The MoU signed with the Spanish Government will see a €1 billion investment in decarbonisation technologies at ArcelorMittal Asturias’ plant in Gijón. The investments will reduce CO2 emissions at ArcelorMittal’s Spanish operations by up to 4.8 million tonnes, which represents approximately 50% of emissions, within the next five years**.

At the heart of the plan is a 2.3 million-tonne green hydrogen DRI unit, complemented by a 1.1 million-tonne hybrid EAF. This starts the transition of the Gijón plant away from the blast furnace-basic oxygen furnace steelmaking production route to the DRI-EAF production route, which carries a significantly lower carbon footprint. The new DRI - which will be the first of its kind in Spain - and EAF will be in production before the end of 2025, with construction anticipated to begin in 2022.

Expressing support for the plan, Spain’s Minister of Industry María Reyes Maroto stated that “the Government of Spain and the ArcelorMittal Group fully agree that the transition towards a decarbonised economy is an essential objective for Spain, and they both recognise the industrial, technological, and regulatory challenges that this transition poses for Spanish industry, as well as the opportunities it offers in terms of innovation and improved competitiveness.”

ArcelorMittal Sestao to become the world's first full-scale zero carbon emissions steel plant

Harnessing green hydrogen and renewable electricity, ArcelorMittal’s Sestao plant will become the world’s first full-scale zero carbon emissions* steel plant by 2025. This development is the result of the MoU that will see the construction of the green hydrogen DRI plant in Gijón. The Gijón DRI will feed the company’s Sestao plant, situated approximately 250km from Gijón, where production is already entirely from the EAF route.

By 2025, the Sestao plant – which manufactures a range of flat steel products for the construction sectors (among others) - will produce 1.6 million tonnes of zero carbon emissions steel by:

• Changing the metallic input by increasing the proportion of circular, recycled scrap, and using green hydrogen-produced DRI from Gijón in its two existing EAFs.
• Powering all steelmaking assets (EAFs, rolling mill, finishing lines) with renewable electricity.
• Introducing several key emerging technologies that will replace the small, remaining use of fossil fuel in the steelmaking process with carbon-neutral energy inputs, such as sustainable biomass or green hydrogen.

Speaking at the signing of the MoU in Gijón, Aditya Mittal, CEO ArcelorMittal, said that “it is widely understood that for the world to achieve net zero by 2050, faster progress over the next decade is essential. The MoU we have signed today will play an important role in doing exactly that.  The construction of the new green hydrogen DRI plant in Gijón will not only enable us to reduce emissions from our Spanish operations by half but will also result in the world’s first full-scale zero carbon emissions steel plant in Sestao.”

Looking further ahead, ArcelorMittal has also committed to achieving net zero*** at the Sestao plant as soon as possible.

Text:
ArcelorMittal Europe Communications
Constructalia

Images and video:
ArcelorMittal

*On a Scope 1 and 2 basis.
**Should green hydrogen not be available at affordable rates by the end of 2025, natural gas would be used to power the DRI furnace. This would still result in a very significant reduction in CO2 emissions of 4 million tonnes - approximately 45%.
***Net zero meaning across Scopes 1, 2, and 3.

In the north of Portugal, almost halfway between Porto and the Spanish town Ourense, the Tâmega River hydropower complex is being developed on the Tâmega River by Spanish power company Iberdrola Generación. Three dams and three hydroelectric plants are being constructed and are one of the largest constructions of this type in Europe in the last 25 years with a total investment cost of €1.5 billion.

Yearly energy output equivalent to the consumption of 440 000 Portuguese households

The Tâmega River hydroelectric complex will be comprised of three dams (named Gouvães, Daivões, and Alto Tâmega) and will have a combined power of 1158 megawatts (MW). Once fully operational, Iberdrola estimate a total of 1766 gigawatt hours (GWh) of electricity will be produced each year - the equivalent of the consumption of 440 000 Portuguese households. This supply of clean energy will omit approximately 1.2m tonnes of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere and reduce consumption of oil by 160 000 tonnes.

ArcelorMittal steel fibres reinforced shotcrete used for underground galleries

Over 500 t of ArcelorMittal high performance steel fibres have been supplied for this project. ArcelorMittal's HE55/35 and FE60/36 fibres have been used to reinforce the underground galleries via shotcrete methods and to construct a robust encasement to protect and cover the steel pipes used to transfer the water.

The construction of the three new dams and hydroelectric plants is developing at a good pace and in line with the timetable set out at the beginning of the project. With two thirds of the work already completed, the complex should be fully complete in 2023 - nine years after initial construction began.

Text:
ArcelorMittal Bars & Rods

Image:
ArcelorMittal Bars & Rods

Related link(s)

Tamega giga battery

Decarbonisation is the most important aspect of ArcelorMittal’s long-term strategy. In line with the Paris Agreement’s goals and the European Green Deal, ArcelorMittal is committing to reduce European CO2 emissions by 30% by 2030 and be carbon neutral by 2050. The company’s new brand, XCarb™, is designed to bring together all of ArcelorMittal’s reduced, low, and zero-carbon products and steelmaking activities.

EcoSheetPile™

Introduced in 2018, ArcelorMittal Europe - Long Products Sheet Piling's EcoSheetPile™ range is manufactured through the electric arc furnace (EAF) route with 520 kg of CO2 emissions per tonne of finished product. To put this into perspective, in 2018 the average CO2 emissions for the global steel industry including all types of production routes (conventional and electric-based) were around 1.85 tonnes per tonne of steel products*. The Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) of the EcoSheetPile™ product range includes a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and is based on the EAF route using 100% recycled material.

The new EcoSheetPile™ Plus: part of ‘XCarb™ recycled and renewably produced’

The new EcoSheetPile™ Plus brand, an essential part of the ‘XCarb™ recycled and renewably produced’ initiative for long products, is based on the Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) route using 100% recycled material and - additionally - 100% renewable electricity.

This allows for the production of the new EcoSheetPile™ Plus range with the unprecedented Global Warming Potential (A1-A3) of 0.37 tonne of CO2-eq per tonne of EcoSheetPile™ Plus produced.

The specific Environmental Product Declaration for EcoSheetPile™ Plus is based on a dedicated ‘Cradle-to-Gate with options’ life-cycle analysis. It was approved by an independent reviewer according to ISO 14025 and EN 15804 standards and published by the German Institut Bauen und Umwelt e.V. (IBU) official programme holder. It also comes with a Guarantee of Origin certifying the renewable electricity sources audited by an external third party.

The most sustainable construction material

Thanks to the possibility of reuse, steel sheet piles integrate perfectly into the circular economy concept. ArcelorMittal sheet piles can be reused up to twelve times before they are recycled as scrap for the EAF-based steel making process.

In addition, further carbon footprint reductions can be achieved thanks to project-based assessments with fully engineered package solutions relying on our high performance and tailor-made sheet pile sections in combination with high strength steel grades.

Independent third-party infrastructure impact studies show that ArcelorMittal's innovative EcoSheetPile™ Plus design can reduce CO2 emissions by up to 58% in the full scope of LCA (cradle-to-grave) compared to conventional construction methods**.

ArcelorMittal’s steel sheet piles are manufactured with transparent indicators for their environmental performance in certified facilities with regard to product quality management and where employees are protected by Health & Safety policies. This makes them environmentally-friendly construction products.

The environmental impact of ArcelorMittal’s hot rolled steel sheet piles is documented in an Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) registered at the Institut Bauen und Umwelt e.V. (IBU) Germany and available here.

Text:
ArcelorMittal Sheet Piling
Constructalia

Images:
ArcelorMittal Sheet Piling

* https://www.sustainablefinance.hsbc.com/-/media/gbm/sustainable/attachments/4016-hsbc-csf-steel-report-2019v5.pdf
* https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/metals-and-mining/our-insights/decarbonization-challenge-for-steel#
* https://www.worldsteel.org/en/dam/jcr:c3acc5fd-e3c2-458c-a2cc-8c4880b9334c/Steel%2527s+contribution+to+a+low+carbon+future.pdf

** ArcelorMittal’s SIMIn studies, jointly elaborated with external partners and our R&D teams, are available upon request.

Related link(s)

EcoSheetPile™ Plus flyer

EcoSheetPiles™ Environmental Product Declaration (EPD)

EcoSheetPile™ Plus Environmental Product Declaration

To support the construction industry’s climate goals, ArcelorMittal Europe – Long Products announced that Environmental Production Declarations (EPDs) are now available for two of its low carbon products. The EPDs provide a life-cycle assessment, detailing the complete environmental footprint of steel sections & merchant bars and EcoSheetPile™ Plus in ArcelorMittal’s recently launched XCarb™ recycled and renewably produced range.

Reducing the carbon footprint of buildings and infrastructure

Speaking about the first product-specific EPDs to be offered, ArcelorMittal Steligence® CEO Olivier Vassart says that “thanks to XCarb™ recycled and renewably produced, we are able to offer steel produced with a CO2 footprint as low as 0.33 per tonne of sections and merchant bars and 0.37 per tonne for the EcoSheetPile™ Plus brand. Now, with these two EPDs, we can support the construction industry to meet tougher requirements to reduce the embedded carbon footprint of buildings and infrastructure.”

Text:
ArcelorMittal Europe Communications
Constructalia

Images:
ArcelorMittal

Related link(s)

XCarb™: Recycled and renewably produced brochure

ArcelorMittal Europe – Long Products launches EPDs for XCarb® recycled and renewably produced range

Also known as the Dutch Vault, the Royal Dutch Mint in Houten in the Netherlands is one of four buildings shortlisted in the Best Industrial & Logistics Development category for the 2021 MIPIM Awards. The exquisite facade for this iconic building displays high-gloss Granite® Silky Shine from ArcelorMittal Europe – Flat Products.

MIPIM Awards: an internationally-renowned real estate competition

Since 1991, the MIPIM Awards have been honouring the most formidable and impressive projects in the world of real estate. The 2021 judges have shortlisted 50 finalists representing outstanding projects in 12 categories. It is now over to the MIPIM delegates to finalise the winning projects in each category. The winners will be selected with delegates’ votes carrying equal weight with the jury’s votes and will be announced at the MIPIM Awards ceremony on Wednesday 8 September, 2021.

Facetted cladding with Granite® Silky Shine

The exterior of the Royal Dutch Mint building resembles a safe with almost no visible opening. The unique design was inspired by the relief particular to the euro coins minted in the Netherlands. The cladding of this golden facade is made up of profiled and prepainted steel sheets (Isis 55-120/7 triangular profiles fabricated by ArcelorMittal Construction using prepainted Granite® Silky Shine Gold 50µm steel from ArcelorMittal Europe – Flat Products) which have been placed in different directions with the vertical and horizontal layers coming together to form the facetted facade. The Granite® Silky Shine facade is attached to the concrete building using a substructure made with Magnelis®, also from ArcelorMittal Europe – Flat Products.

Text:
Constructalia

Images:
SWAD Video
LT Photography

At Constructalia, we are always striving to bring you the most up-to-date and easy-to-find information about ArcelorMittal Europe steel products and solutions for construction. We spent some time this summer creating new points of reference on Constructalia for you – our valued users.

Constructalia cinematheque

We built a cinematheque to house product, event, training, project, and corporate videos in one place. With just the click of a button, you can be watching the latest webinar or checking out the newest product video.

Steel grades

Looking for steel grade information, but don’t want to search by product? We gathered all of our available mechanical, technical, chemical, and coating particulars for ArcelorMittal steel grades into one hub page for easy access.

Partners

As our Partners section continues to grow, we decided it was time to renovate. You can now locate our partners by category, such as roofing & cladding, agriculture, or light steel structures & profiles.

Text:
Constructalia

Images:
ArcelorMittal Europe - Flat Products, P. Le Pense
Xavier Font Solà
Meteor Systems
ArcelorMittal International
Meko Metal
BP2.eu®

Windows version 2.0.10 of ArcelorMittal’s pre-design software for large span trusses with the European rules for steel structures, Trusses+, is now available!

This tool can be used for both verification and optimisation.

The new version includes the following modifications:

• automatic updates for the ArcelorMittal sections database
• automatic updates for new versions of the software
• bug fixes, such as input fields that did not accept negative numbers and functionality when load definitions were incomplete

Download this new version for free on our Software page.

Widely used for the construction of a variety of structures such as quay walls and breakwaters in harbours, bank reinforcements on rivers and canals, underpasses, as well as global hazard protection schemes, sheet piles have proven their performance in seismic areas in many countries around the globe.

Chile, the country that has suffered the strongest earthquakes in recorded history, provides an excellent example: Whereas its concrete-based ports have been severely damaged, the Port of Mejillones, constructed in 2003 using an HZ®/AZ® combined wall for the quay wall and AS 500 straight web sheet piles for the breakwater, has not suffered any damage throughout many heavy earthquakes with magnitudes of up to 7.7. This is the perfect example of the effectiveness of flexible sheet pile structures under extreme seismic conditions.

Nevertheless, a certain reluctance to use sheet piles in seismic areas remains common among some designers. This concern may come from their experience of conventional design methods which do not favour flexible walls in seismic areas. These design methods are usually comprised of pseudo-static calculations using the Mononobe-Okabe theory (1931).

Numerical studies and physical experiments (centrifuge testing) have shown that these conventional methods of design are overestimating the loads on retaining walls - especially in the case of flexible walls. Although EN 1998-5 allows for a reduction of the seismic action depending on the acceptable displacements (reduction factor “r”), this only applies to gravity walls and not to anchored walls such as sheet pile walls, despite their inherent ductility.

Today, powerful design tools using Finite Element Modelling (FEM) allow for dynamic calculations that can accurately predict the behaviour of the retaining walls undergoing different seismic loadings, including internal forces, deformations, increases in pore water pressures, and expected modes of failure.

Material cost savings thanks to dynamic design methods

A research project led by ArcelorMittal R&D and a study carried out by world-leading maritime consultant engineering company SENER demonstrated significant optimisation potential. In the study, a wide spectrum of cases was analysed (four water depths; four seismic accelerations; two soil conditions) that compared the conventional pseudo-static method based on EN 1998-5 using elasto-plastic subgrade reaction software and the fully dynamic advanced method using FEM software.

All of the cases studied showed substantial optimisation potential when using FEM design. The bending moments in pseudo-static design are 40% to 126% higher than those of FEM design. When considering the respective sheet pile sections, this could result in up to 50% of material cost savings using the advanced seismic design methods.

Hydrodynamic loads properly analysed contribute to additional material savings

Hydrodynamic loads are commonly considered pseudo-static and calculated according to EN 1998-5 using the Westergaard formula as a permanent load from the water during the entire duration of the earthquake. SENER used FEM and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) to calculate the impact of hydrodynamic loads on a sheet pile wall during seismic action, considering soil-fluid interactions under dynamic analysis.

Using the traditional Westergaard formula in EN 1998-5 matches the hydrodynamic loads obtained by CFD at a certain point of time during the earthquake. However, as Westergaard considers these to be permanent loads during the entire earthquake, an overestimation of its effect is evident.

The FEM calculations carried out using Plaxis 2D compared the results obtained when using the traditional Westergaard load with those obtained when using a realistic time-dependent variable load (through a dynamic load or added masses). The results showed an increase of 24.5% in the bending moment (with respect to the effects from the purely seismic action) when using the traditional Westergaard load compared to 4% when using the instantaneous load. In this case study, considering a realistic hydrodynamic load translated into a material cost saving of 14% when considering the corresponding sheet pile sections.

Brochure - Seismic design of sheet piles: economic benefits of advanced design methods

To further enhance design and project efficiencies with sheet piling solutions in areas of high seismic risk, the brochure ‘Seismic design of sheet piles: economic benefits of advanced design methods’ presents innovative design methods for extreme dynamic loading conditions in ports and waterways and other infrastructure domains.

Feel free to contact ArcelorMittal Sheet Piling for more detailed information or for assistance with the dynamic design of sheet piles using FEM.

Text:
ArcelorMittal Sheet Piling
Constructalia

Images:
ArcelorMittal Sheet Piling
Puerto Angamos

Related link(s)

Seismic design of sheet piles: economic benefits of advanced design methods