Steel is the tough one - the vast majority of new steel is produced using blast furnaces and coke. DRI is still a fringe product.
I mean, the UK proudly trumpets that they're coal-free, while entertaining a new coking coal mine.
Steel is the tough one - the vast majority of new steel is produced using blast furnaces and coke. DRI is still a fringe product.
I mean, the UK proudly trumpets that they're coal-free, while entertaining a new coking coal mine.
Steel is also a small percentage of coal use. The vast majority of coal is used for electricity generation.
Putting numbers on that (for the us) from 2022 [1]:
Electric power—469.9 MMst—91.7%
Industrial total—41.9 MMst—8.2%
Commercial—0.8 MMst—0.2%Getting down to 6% of our current coal use would be amazing. So much lung cancer and asthma would be prevented.
[1] https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/coal/use-of-coal.php