Driving the industry towards near zero
The Steel Decarbonisation Scale adopts a scrap-variable approach designed to promote real emissions reductions across the global steel industry. By accounting for the proportion of scrap used in steelmaking, it provides a clear, comparable, technology-neutral method to evaluate emissions performance across production routes.
Recognised by the G7 and leading international organisations, including the IEA and international standards bodies, the Decarbonisation Scale helps steelmakers demonstrate genuine decarbonisation progress while avoiding competition for limited scrap supplies that could lead to carbon leakage.
The scrap-variable approach
The scrap-variable approach (also called the sliding scale or decarbonisation scale) provides a practical framework for decarbonising steel while acknowledging the physical limits of scrap availability.
Scrap is a powerful lever for reducing emissions, but its supply is limited. Today, it can only meet around a third of global steel demand, and even by 2050, it is projected to satisfy less than half of the demand for new steel. The scrap-variable approach was designed to reflect these limits, incentivising the use of scrap and rewarding genuine emissions reductions across all steel production routes without driving competition for a scarce resource.
The Decarbonisation Scale
The Decarbonisation Progress Levels
The Steel Decarbonisation Scale uses four Progress Levels to drive emissions reductions across the steel industry. These thresholds provide a comparable and equitable framework to track and reward a steelmaker’s decarbonisation progress:
- Progress Level 1: Entry level recognising those that are performing better than average based on the global average emissions in 2022
- Progress Levels 2 and 3: Interim milestones on the road to near zero, considered lower emissions steel
- Progress Level 4: Near-zero emissions steel
They enable like-for-like comparison across all steel sites worldwide, offering an internationally consistent way to measure improvement while recognising that different companies and regions will advance at different rates.
To align with a 1.5°C climate pathway, the entire industry must reach at least Progress Level 1 by 2030, with many sites advancing significantly further. By 2040, the majority of steel production needs to meet Progress Level 3, with most sites achieving Progress Level 4 by 2050. Read more about how we’ve mapped the decarbonisation journey for the steel sector in our report, Charting Progress to 1.5°C through Certification.
No. The Steel Decarbonisation Scale is explicitly neutral on scrap use. Higher performance levels are achieved by reducing greenhouse gas emissions per tonne of input, whether scrap or primary iron.
This means steelmakers are rewarded for lowering emissions in both scrap-based and ore-based production. The Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE) refers to this as “dual decarbonisation”: improving the carbon performance of both recycling and primary steelmaking routes.
Scrap availability from now until 2050 will increase as steel produced over the past 30–40 years reaches the end of its life, particularly in regions such as China. As a result, worldsteel estimates that scrap use in steelmaking could rise from around 500 million tonnes in 2024 to about 900 million tonnes by 2050.
However, demand for new steel is also expected to grow, reaching around 2.5 billion tonnes per year by 2050. Scrap will therefore remain a scarce and valuable input. Steelmakers are already investing in new Electric Arc Furnace capacity in anticipation of greater scrap availability, and the additional supply is expected to be fully utilised without the need for subsidies or incentives.
At first glance, this may seem counterintuitive. But with steel already being recycled at around 85%, nearly all available scrap is already in use.
Because the total supply of scrap is fixed at any given time, allocating more scrap to one product, site, or customer simply reduces the amount available elsewhere. While scrap can be redistributed, its overall quantity does not increase.
In this context, the most effective way to reduce emissions is to decarbonise all steelmaking processes — not just those using high scrap shares. The Steel Decarbonisation Scale addresses this reality by rewarding real emissions reductions across every production route, regardless of scrap content.
Learn more about the Steel Decarbonisation Scale.
Are you a steelmaker looking to pursue certification against ResponsibleSteel’s Decarbonisation Progress Levels? Or a steel buyer, investor, policymaker, or other industry stakeholder wanting to understand how you can leverage the Decarbonisation Scale to meet your climate targets?
