Paul Tardy was recently in Stockholm to evaluate Mistra’s research programme Stålkretsloppet. Together with a group of international researchers, he evaluated whether or not the programme should receive support for an additional four years. Tardy, the Hungarian representative in the EU's carbon and steel research fund, and experienced at evaluating research programmes, was impressed by the Swedish researchers’ reporting. "It's the first time I've seen a research programme in the steel industry that is so well formulated, and so clearly focused on reducing environmental impacts."The industry collapsed
Paul Tardy has 30 years of experience with steel research, in both academia and industry. After starting his career at the University in Miskolc, Hungary's third largest city, he worked until the early 1990s at the Steel Research Institute in Budapest. But after the fall of communism, the institute, like my many other national research institutes, was closed by the new government. Hungarian industry collapsed, explains Paul Tardy. Now he works for the Hungarian steel industry’s branch organization, and is responsible for energy and environmental questions. Tardy wants to reduce the industry's energy use and its carbon-dioxide emissions. He is involved in organizing a large international conference on that theme in Hungary next year. Paul Tardy believes that the projects in Stålkrestloppet are good for the climate. ”Energy use in the Swedish steel industry and Swedish society will decrease. Not by so many percentage points in total – but because of the large problems we face every contribution is important.”
Iron scrap
For several decades, the Swedish steel industry has worked actively with environment and energy questions. Through the programme Stålkretsloppet, the industry, together with academic researchers, is trying to take a comprehensive systems approach; from steel production and use of steel products to waste management and recycling. Different projects are focused on different parts of the steel lifecycle. An overarching goal is to conserve raw materials and energy.
Two of the projects in the programme are trying to increase recycling of scrap steel and iron, in part through improved sorting of recyclable materials and in part by developing new methods for cleaning scrap, to remove surface pollutants. "Globally, recycling more scrap is the most important question for the steel industry right now. But to do that, the quality of scrap must be increased," says Paul Tardy.
Even if we already recycle a lot of scrap steel today, the issue of increased recycling levels is on the agenda of most steel producers, claims Paul Tardy. That is reflected, for example, in the fact that the price of scrap has escalated: since 2005 prices have doubled, and in just the last few months scrap prices have increased by about 30 percent. But to increase recycling even more, steel producers have to learn to use scrap that is discarded today because of its poor quality.
Slag management
Another issue that has gotten a lot of attention in both Sweden and abroad is slag management. Slag is a byproduct that is created in large quantities in the process of producing steel. A large share of the slag is already re-used internally in steel plants today, but thousands of tons of slag still end up in the waste stream every year. One alternative is to use slag as a filling material in road construction. Today many road construction companies prefer to use locally-produced limestone, because it is cheaper, explains Paul Tardy. Therefore, he is calling for clearer political support for slag use. Tardy wants the EU to adopt regulations that require that slag be used in given percentage for filling material. "The task for lawmakers must be to reduce the total environmental impact," says Paul Tardy.
