Read on Twitter
On that carbon neutral future for US Steel. Big: https://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/news/2021/04/30/us-steel-cancels-millions-in-upgrades-to-mon.html?ana=e_pit_bn_breakingnews_breakingnews via @PghBizTimes
Seriously, I've been saying since it was announced that US Steel's recent purchase of an electric furnace in Arkansas, and investments in Alabama bode ill for their future in SWPA https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2019/oct/01/big-river-steel-get-700k-us-steel-agreement-two-co/?breaking
To be clear, just speculation on my part, but it feels to me that deep in the bowels of the corporation a strategic decision was made a couple years ago that Edgar Speer was right 40+ years ago:
Lest i'm being overly subtle (Not, but). There is no future for Clairton without massive reinvestment. Without Clairton, there likely is no future for the ET Works in Braddock. If West Mifflin were the only big US Steel plant in the region, does the HQ stay here?
But... just to cover my bases. I'll stand corrected if US Steel soon announces a big plan to build a cutting edge hydrogen blast furnace here in a reasonable future time frame. But barring that....
Bueller?
Bueller?
But seriously, today's news was written at least back in 2019, but nobody wanted to believe: https://twitter.com/chrisbriem/status/1207301926632615937
& this is just for @BobGradeck, but this is the perfect reference. This editorial cartoon from over a century ago is really the apotheosis of denial. Experts were questioning the steel industry's regional future back then, but local powers that be just refused to believe
What is really interesting is reading US Steel's explanation for this big decision alongside this recent report from an industry group pushing back on the idea that the air in Pittsburgh is less than ideal. See:
https://pghworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/PGHWorks_AirQuality_Report_rnd4_digital.pdf
https://pghworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/PGHWorks_AirQuality_Report_rnd4_digital.pdf
the worst part of this is an announcement like this that makes clear there will not be big reinvestment at the Clairton Works, yet not an operational plan to shut it down, means other investment anywhere near Clairton will be depressed long into the future.
No plans for redevelopment of the site can begin (a gargantuan project) all while few will risk investment near a plant likely to close at some point in the future.. and likely to remain an unremediated brownfield. Need to plan for Clairton's future now!
Very strange quote in here: "We had the opportunity to make some of the greenest steel in the world right here in Braddock"
By no definition is coke-based (= "carbon-based") steel production ever going to be the cleanest way to make steel??? https://www.publicsource.org/mon-valley-clairton-us-steel-coke-works-pollution-f-grade-air-quality/
By no definition is coke-based (= "carbon-based") steel production ever going to be the cleanest way to make steel??? https://www.publicsource.org/mon-valley-clairton-us-steel-coke-works-pollution-f-grade-air-quality/
The cleanest way to make steel is likely hydrogen based , assuming a clean method to produce hydrogen, which is happening (elsewhere) - https://bellona.org/news/climate-change/2021-03-hydrogen-in-steel-production-what-is-happening-in-europe-part-one
History here is sad. USS was incredibly slow to adopt basic oxygen furnaces which Europe and Japan jumped on in the 1950s, then abdicated the greatest innovation in steel by not investing in electric furnaces minimills. The vestige of Big Steel is barely trying to catch up
