Non-government organization and clean energy reporter Global Energy Monitor has released a Global Blast Furnace Tracker (GBFT), which is the first free and publicly available dataset with global coverage of blast furnaces.

The tracker aims to provide data on blast furnaces across the world, in all stages of construction and activity.

According to Global Energy Monitor, the tracker catalogues 1408 blast furnaces across 477 plants in 55 countries for a total of 2.0 billion tonnes of pig iron capacity (1.45 billion tonnes operating with an additional 0.28 billion tonnes in development and 0.23 billion tonnes idled/retired), which represents 91% of global pig iron capacity compared to global estimates of approximately 1.6 billion. The GBFT builds off of the organization’s Global Steel Plant Tracker (GSPT), which provides ownership and location information on each of the plants included in the GBFT.

The tracker also includes furnaces that have been proposed or under construction since 2017 and retired or mothballed since 2020.

To learn more, download the data on Global Energy Monitor's website, visit the interactive map and dashboard, and view the summary tables.