India’s Ministry of Steel is working on a policy to generate demand for green steel through offering incentives for users to procure green steel, the secretary at the Ministry of Steel, Sandeep Poundrik, said in a statement on Wednesday, September 11.
Mr. Poundrik said that the move comes amid mounting global pressure on countries to cut the carbon footprint in manufacturing, notably the move by the European Union to impose a 25 percent carbon tax on its imports of steel and aluminium among other goods.
As an implementation strategy, the steel ministry will launch a green steel mission soon, on the lines of a green hydrogen mission, where components of the policy will aim at offering some incentives to users to procure larger volumes of green steel, thereby boosting demand and offering sustainability of operations for steel mills, Poundrik said.
“The first task of the steel ministry moving forward post the presentation of the report based on extensively researched reports given by 14 task forces would be to come out with a definition of green steel. But the 14 reports also have a report on taxonomy, so we will move forward from there,” he said.
The reports of the 14 task forces have suggested that the country needs both demand and supply side initiatives to facilitate the greening of the steel sector. It said the ministry is keen to generate demand for green steel in the country by developing the framework for a Green Public Procurement (GPP) policy for steel, which could then be taken up by the Finance Ministry for development and action.
The report recommended that the Ministry of Steel set up an agency along the lines of Energy Efficiency Services Ltd, a ministry of power-promoted energy services company, for bulk procurement of green steel to facilitate consumption in both public and private procurement.
It also suggested prioritizing the development of an ecosystem for green steel production and consumption by creating a robust MRV (measurement, reporting and verification) system for emissions accounting, a registry of green steel production and consumption, and tracking of green steel certification.
