CONF: China working on standardizing steel scrap market
Source: Mysteel
Apr 25, 2019 15:00
By the end of China’s current 13th five-year planning period (2016-2020) NDRC will establish 50 large-sized solid waste recycling yards and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) will be setting up 50 large-sized raw material supply bases nationwide, he disclosed.
So far, 150 enterprises have submitted applications for NDRC’s program, according to him. Yang agreed, though, that probably all the 50 bases will only be able to come into being by the end of 2020 and even then, will be in a period of initial inauguration.
In the near term, the China Association of Metalscrap Utilization (CAMU) is assisting the MIIT in reviewing the qualifications of the steel scrap collecting and recycling enterprises, according to Li Shubin, CAMU vice chairman. Since 2012, China has released six lists of qualified steel scrap suppliers, totaling 252 in number and hosting over 70 million tonnes/year in capacity, Mysteel Global understands.
The release of the ministry’s seventh batch of approved scrap enterprises is expected after the Labour Day holiday in the first week of May in China, Li told conference delegates.
China’s steel scrap supply may exceed 300 million tonnes/year by 2030, with the country having accumulated over 13 billion tonnes of steel resources available for recycling, according to Li. Such resources have great market potential given the central government’s emphasis on greener and more efficient steelmaking in China.
However, “the industry is faced with high costs, great variations of (scrap) quality, and high industrial power charges (which are inhibiting) China’s steelmakers from replacing blast furnaces with electric arc furnaces,” Li said, telling Mysteel Global that scrap quality, tax incentives, and sizeable scrap processing and recycling yards are crucial for the industry’s development.
China’s crude steel output grew 6.6% on year to 928 million tonnes for 2018, but within that total, steel produced using electric arc furnaces (EAFs) accounted for only 9.8%, Li noted. Moreover, the EAF proportion declined to about 9.6% for the first quarter of 2019 despite the country’s steel output increasing by 9.9% on year to 231 million tonnes, he noted.
Written by Hongmei Li, li.hongmei@mysteel.com
Edited by Russ McCulloch, russ.mcculloch@mysteel.com
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