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Italian steel between challenges and opportunities: Carlo Beltrame’s vision

Carlo Beltrame, interviewed by siderweb, highlights a structural problem with European policies for #decarbonisation: while the European Union promotes the ecological transition, the current measures do not seem to adequately reward those who have already embarked on this path.

The data are significant: over 85% of Italy’s steel production is represented by steel obtained from scrap iron in electric furnaces. This makes our country the first ‘electro-steel industry’ in the Union. However, these producers have not benefited from state aid. Instead, European support measures appear to be mainly oriented towards the conversion of traditional blast furnaces.

The system’s criticalities emerge on several fronts: disparities in energy costs between Member States, with Italy penalised compared to other countries, difficulties in the supply of scrap due to export policies, and the risk that the CBAM may paradoxically favour non-EU producers over already virtuous European ones.

The consequence is a competitive disadvantage for furnace producers, who do not benefit from adequate trade protection, public support or protection from the new carbon adjustment mechanism.

In spite of this context, AFV Beltrame Group continues its investments: it is preparing to enter the slab market after having built a new casting at the Vicenza site, continues with the expansion of the Romanian plant and has obtained, as the first European producer, the certification by the Global Steel Climate Council® (GSCC®) of the Group’s emissions (Corporate Average Steel Emissions Intensity, Casei) and the validation of its medium and long-term decarbonisation targets (Science-Based Emissions Targets, Sbet).

Read the full interview here.