Representatives from the global steel industry have underlined the importance of trade and common emissions measurement methodologies in achieving their goals of reducing carbon emissions from the sector and reshaping low carbon emission steel value chains.
During a 12 September session at the WTO’s Public Forum, the executives also highlighted efforts such as the Steel Standards Principles initiative, launched at the COP28 UN Climate Change Conference last year, in helping achieve their aims.
The executives expressed confidence that the steel industry is on the right path towards achieving their carbon reduction goals but underlined the importance of having supportive policies in place, including on trade and on common emissions measurement methodologies.
"Despite the constraints of time, the constraints of funds and training, and research and development, I am quite confident that the global steel industry is on track to reduce CO2 emissions, and this will already be visible by 2030 and 2040," said Edwin Basson, Director General of the World Steel Association.
Anne van Ysendyck, Vice President and head of government affairs and environment with ArcelorMittal, said the bigger obstacles facing the industry are the lack of supporting policy, which has a catalytic role to play in the decarbonization and the availability and affordability of clean energy so crucially needed to decarbonize the sector.
"In order to induce decarbonization at scale, we really need climate policies and trade policies to converge more and take away barriers instead of creating more and more barriers," she said, citing differences in carbon pricing policies as an example.
Adina Renee Adler, Executive Director of the Global Steel Climate Council, joined Anne van Ysendyck in welcoming the work on common emissions measurement methodologies through initiatives such as the Steel Standards Principles, which seek to align how greenhouse gas emissions are measured in the steel sector.
"Businesses need open, transparent and predictable markets, which is a mantra here at the WTO," she said. "For us, that means making sure that all the methodologies, the calculations, the data, anything you want to know about how our members are going to get there is freely available."
