Thyssen-Krupp wants to produce the steel with hydrogen in the future.
(Photo: imago images/Rupert Oberhäuser)
Berlin The dimensions are enormous: Europe’s largest steelworks currently consumes 4.3 terawatt hours of electricity. At the Duisburg site, Thyssen-Krupp Steel is currently still producing with coal. In the future, the same production will consume around 46 terawatt hours – around four and a half times as much as the city of Hamburg. But only 8.5 terawatt hours of this is used in Duisburg, with another 37 terawatt hours to produce the required hydrogen.
Bernhard Osburg, Chairman of Thyssen-Krupp Steel Europe, outlined at the Handelsblatt Energy Summit in Berlin on Tuesday how complex the changeover is for the group. Not only the green energy must be available. Replacing the first blast furnace with a new direct reduction plant will cost the group well over a billion euros, he said.
Planning for this is progressing. Thyssen-Krupp intends to place the first orders this year. Clarity about the funding would help, emphasizes Osburg. The supervisory board needs well-founded data on the basis of which it can make decisions. The coalition had recently promised to offer contracts for differences in which the state would assume part of the investment costs. In addition, funding applications are running as projects of common interest, so-called IPCEIs.
The green turn in steel production costs money: steel manufacturers will have to buy electricity and hydrogen. A large part of the hydrogen is to be imported. But in order to meet the massive demand, new offshore wind farms off the German coast and electrolysers must be built nearby.
Top jobs of the day
Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.
The transport has not yet been solved. The member of the Bundestag Ingrid Nestle (Greens) promised that the planning for hydrogen pipelines will start soon, because there is no question that they would be needed.
“New Seriousness in Energy Policy”
Stefan Kapferer, CEO of the network operator 50Hertz, gives hope that the electricity transport will work. With the shutdown of coal-fired power plants, capacity will also be freed up for individual lines. In this way, electricity could also be transported from the North Sea to Ludwigshafen via the grid in eastern Germany. The prerequisite would be that connections from West to East are built. Achieving this by 2030 is ambitious, but possible.
Industry is ready to invest, said Michael Vassiliadis from the IGBCE union. However, the prices should not be ignored. If the transition is not organized pragmatically, the location could become less attractive, he warned. The glass, paper and ceramics industries are already at the limit because of the high energy prices.
The goal of climate neutrality is no longer in doubt. That ensures “that problems are no longer trivialized,” says Vassiliadis. After all, an administrative effort “of a similar magnitude to that of German unity” is needed.
MEP Nestle confirmed that the status of an industrial nation had to be worked out again and again. But she is less concerned about this than in previous years, because investments and modernization are now being made again. “The new seriousness in energy policy is encouraging,” she said.
More: Economics Minister Habeck wants to give industry massive support in converting to climate neutrality
