MMK Presents Its ESG, CO2 Emissions Reduction Projects
MMK shared its sustainability initiatives at the 19th Metallurgical Summit titled "Russian Steel: Growth Strategy", which took place in Tula on 2-3 June 2022. This year’s topic at one of the main events for Russia’s metallurgical industry was "The Global Energy Transition and the Russian Ferrous Metals Industry."
Grigory Shchurov, MMK's Director for Occupational Health and Safety and Environmental Protection, said the Company in 2021 achieved an 11% reduction of CO2 emissions under Scope 1 and 2, to 1.95 tonnes of CO2 per tonne of steel. As part of MMK's sustainability strategy to 2025, the Company aims to further reduce its emissions to 1.8 tonnes.
"The main drivers of greenhouse gas emissions reduction for MMK are our projects for the construction of coke oven battery complex No. 12 and blast furnace No. 11, which is estimated to reduce CO2 emissions by 1.7 million tonnes per year. Meanwhile, the new coke oven battery will enable us to reduce CO2 emissions by another 1.1 million tonnes per year by applying dry coke quenching technology and improving its quality, automating coke oven heating and putting five old batteries out of operation. In addition to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Coke Battery No. 12 will cut emissions of hazardous and polluting substances by 11,000 tonnes per year, which means that the overall environmental effect of the project will be even higher," Shchurov said.
He noted that MMK is actively engaged in improving energy efficiency in its production chain in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. By 2025, among other projects, the Company plans to renovate the blast furnace air heaters and the reheating furnaces of hot rolling mill 2000.
Yaroslava Vrubel, Head of Sustainable Development at MMK, discussed the Company’s experience in its ESG transformation, noting that MMK Group supports global climate change initiatives and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs).
In 2021, for the first time in its history, MMK Group carried out an identification and assessment of physical and transient climate risks for Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works. Now, the Company will continue to implement its project on the comprehensive analysis and assessment of climate risks in accordance with the requirements of the Climate Change Financial Disclosure (TCFD) working group for key production processes.
Another critical area of MMK's ESG transformation is to achieve the Zero Injury target and reduce the LTIFR to 0.45, which for 2021 dropped by 6.1% to stand at 0.62. In this context, occupational health and safety measures and the introduction of new safety systems are of key importance. Last year, MMK expanded its automated system for monitoring personnel in hazardous areas using machine vision, and introduced a video analytics system to monitor safety compliance. In addition, more than 26,500 employees completed safety awareness training, including with the use of VR technology. Nearly 18,500 more employees of all age groups, including managers, specialists and workers, attended various training programmes as part of MMK's corporate culture of opportunity.
Participants of the Summit in Tula included industry experts, government officials, as well as managers and specialists from leading steel industry companies, including EVRAZ, Metalloinvest, Mechel, NLMK, Severstal, OMK, TMK and IMH. The main topics of discussion were the green transformation in Russia's ferrous metallurgy, steel companies' operations in the face of decarbonisation challenges, steel market conditions and demand prospects, as well as the best ESG practices and their impact on companies’ global rankings.