38 | New Scientist | 16 November 2019

Zero carbon’s

hard problem

Carbon emissions from

concrete and steel

production are a huge

problem – but a huge

opportunity to score a

crucial climate victory,

says Adam Vaughan

D

ANGER. No unauthorized entry.

Hot rolling in progress.” If anything,

the sign beneath the dirty hunk of

industrial machinery underplays things.

When the 11-tonne slab of metal I’ve been

watching emerges from the furnace, heated

to 1300°C, it glows incandescent white. Then

it zips along a conveyor belt, hissing and

steaming as it is cooled by water jets, before

a line of rolling cylinders press it into the

final product: a sheet of gleaming steel.

For all that we live in the digital age, we

still rely on hot and dirty processes like this

to construct our cities, homes and vehicles.

Walking around the steelworks in Newport,

UK, I get a sense of the immense energy

required – and this is only the stage at which

the steel is worked. Making it from raw iron ore

is even more intensive. In fact, the production

Features

“