When will steel go green? How B.C. coal fuels one of the highest emitting industries in the world
CBC
Our planet is changing. So is our journalism. This story is part of a CBC News initiative entitled "Our Changing Planet" to show and explain the effects of climate change and what is being done about it.
The calls from COP26 have been clear: the world must stop burning coal if it hopes to avoid catastrophic global temperature rise.
So why then does British Columbia continue to be the Canadian leader in coal extraction and export? The answer: worldwide demand for steel continues to be sky high.
Niney-five per cent of B.C. coal is metallurgical as opposed to thermal. Thermal coal is used to make steam that produces electricity. Metallurgical coal, or coking coal, is mined to produce the carbon used in steel-making and is shipped mostly to Asian countries for that purpose.
In developing countries like China and India, where infrastructure like railways, roads, bridges and buildings is being built en masse, steel is crucial to continued growth.
But just because B.C. doesn't produce and export thermal coal — which is nearly universally maligned for its high emissions — it doesn't mean we're not contributing to a massive amount of carbon emissions.
According to research organization Net Zero Steel, it's estimated that seven per cent of all global greenhouse gas emissions come from manufacturing steel.
To make steel, oxygen must be removed from iron oxide. In order to do that, a fuel called coke is required, and that's made by heating metallurgical coal in a blast furnace. Iron ore reduction and the subsequent smelting process are by far the most carbon intensive aspects of steel-making.
According to the province's 2020 overview of the coal industry, production volumes were expected to be 25.1 million tonnes in 2020, down from 30 million tonnes in 2019.
Coal is easily B.C.'s most valuable mined product, with sales close to $4 billion.
In 2019, B.C. coal represented 48 per cent of all Canadian production. The provincial government says coal production employs thousands of people, mostly in the Elk Valley in southeastern B.C. and in the northeastern region of the province near Tumbler Ridge.
Experts say there are a number of ways to lower emissions from steel-making, but perhaps the most promising possibility is the idea of removing metallurgical coal from the process altogether.
Clean hydrogen can be used instead to strip the oxygen from the iron ore.
"It's quite feasible that starting, say, five years from now, all new steel plants are using some version of this technology," said Chris Bataille, adjunct professor at Simon Fraser University and a lead author for the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The new owner of Ontario steelmaker Stelco says his company "will not disappoint the people of Hamilton and Nanticoke," where the business's major facilities are based.
A Winnipegger is warning others about an intricate scam she says she almost fell for.
Fort William First Nation is opposing a planned redevelopment of the Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) 117 year old Kakabeka Falls Generating Station, which is located in their traditional territory.
A building that sits at the corner of Sussex Street and Brunswick Avenue has had many lives over the last century — being a church, a school and offices. Now it's set to become housing, at a time when the city sorely needs it.
A Waterloo, Ont., elementary school principal will be sentenced in the new year after pleading guilty to child sexual exploitation charges following a joint investigation that involved the London, Toronto and Waterloo police services.
Students at UPEI have let their student union know what they want from the province this fiscal year, and those priorities are reflected in a 2024-2025 advocacy document brought to the legislature on Wednesday.
Larger communities in the N.W.T. will soon see a boost in their territorial funding to maintain infrastructure and deliver services — like water and waste management — but the increase still falls short of what communities need.
The toxic drug crisis has taken more than 47,000 lives in Canada since 2016 and the synthetic opioid fentanyl has become a household name. But now, what's believed to be an even more potent class of synthetic drugs is showing up in drug busts across the country: nitazenes.
The Liberal government and the NDP have agreed to introduce a two-month GST vacation on certain items before the holiday season, Radio-Canada has learned.
Veterinarians are warning Londoners to make sure their dogs are vaccinated and keeping clean after a deadly virus outbreak was declared in London this week.
Registered nurses rallied in St. John's Wednesday as part of a week-long convention, again calling on the Newfoundland and Labrador government to create permanent solutions to staff shortages and workplace violence.