Oddly, As Steelmaking Decarbonizes, Coal Country Gets New Life

Oddly, As Steelmaking Decarbonizes, Coal Country Gets New Life

Steel work production, view of blast furnace, IG Metall factory, Salzgitter Germany. (Photo by ... [+] plus49/Construction Photography/Avalon/Getty Images) The old industrial economy has come out from behind the desk to meet its counterpart in the New Energy Economy. Case in point: Nucor NUE Corp.'s $2. 7 billion investment in West Virginia. The steel mill will be completed by 2024 and will rely heavily on green energy to power its facility. Steel is the cornerstone of the green economy. It goes into everything from wind turbines to solar farms to electric vehicles. But steel making is a carbon-intensive pursuit, and the industry is trying to reduce its CO2 emissions. The measures include using recycled scrap and renewable energy to power the plants — either generated for the sites or purchased through long-term contracts. But the most significant move would be to use clean hydrogen — and less coal — to make steel. "The green economy is being built on steel, and Nucor is proving that it can be produced in a sustainable way that can help the world meet its climate goals," says Leon Topalian, chief executive of Nucor. "For more than 50 years, Nucor has been built on a