b'SUSTAINABILITYIs High-strength Steel the Keyto Lower Embodied Carbon?BY::MANDI AUGUSTYNSKI,P.ENG., M.ENG. Embodied carbon for steel is becoming a hot-button issue these days in Canada and abroad. This value quantifies the amount of carbon emissions for the whole lifecycle of a product. From steel to milk, this value includes everything from resource extraction to decommissioning. Steels lifecycle is unique, having the majority of its embodied carbon coming from the material processing stage. The carbon emissions from this stage are directly related to the chemical processofsteelproduction.Thetraditional blast-oxygenfurnace(BOF)wasinventedin 1948 and served as an improvement on the 1856 Bessemer process. The primary chemical reactants in these processes are iron ore and cokingcoal.Thecoalsuppliesthecarbon neededtoreducetheoxygen-heavyiron ore into pure iron. As can be expected, this produceshighquantitiesofCO 2 ,whichare then typically released into the atmosphere. Alternatively, electric arc furnaces (EAF) rose toprominencefromtheruinsofpost-WWII Europe. This cheap and efficient method of steelmakingusesscrapsteelandelectricityno coal required. However, due to global limitationsintheamountofscrapsteelin circulation,notallsteelproductioncanbe donebyEAF.PrimaryemissionsfromEAFs can be attributed to the greenness of the local electricalgrid.Dirtygridscanhavealarge impact on the overall steel-related emissions for EAF.One of the benefits of steel as a material is its variety of available strengths. For ultra precise tooling, steel can reach yield strengths of 2,100MPa. For structural steel we typically design with yield strengths closer to 400MPa. 26|SUMMER 2025 ADVANTAGE STEEL'