An Integrated Analysis on the Synergistic Reduction of Carbon and Pollution Emissions from China’s Iron and Steel Industry

Decarbonization and decontamination of the iron and steel industry (ISI), which contributes up to 15% to anthropogenic CO₂ emissions (or carbon emissions) and significant proportions of air and water pollutant emissions in China, are challenged by the huge demand for steel. Carbon and pollutants often share common emission sources, indicating that emission reduction could be achieved synergistically. Here, we explored the inherent potential of measures to adjust feedstock composition and technological structure and to control the size of the ISI to achieve carbon emission reduction (CER) and pollution emission reduction (PER). We investigated five typical pollutants in this study, namely, petroleum hydrocarbon pollutants and chemical oxygen demand in wastewater, particulate matter, SO₂, and NO_x in off gases, and examined synergies between CER and PER by employing cross elasticity for the period between 2022 and 2035. The results suggest that a reduction of 8.7%–11.7% in carbon emissions and 20%–31% in pollution emissions (except for particulate matter emissions) could be achieved by 2025 under a high steel scrap ratio (SSR) scenario. Here, the SSR and electric arc furnace (EAF) ratio serve critical roles in enhancing synergies between CER and PER (which vary with the type of pollutant). However, subject to a limited volume of steel scrap, a focused increase in the EAF ratio with neglection of the available supply of steel scrap to EAF facilities would lead to an increase carbon and pollution emissions. Although CER can be achieved through SSR and EAF ratio optimization, only when the crude steel production growth rate remains below 2.2% can these optimization measures maintain the emissions in 2030 at a similar level to that in 2021. Therefore, the synergistic effects between PER and CER should be considered when formulating a development route for the ISI in the future.