A report by CDP, formerly known as Carbon Disclosure Project, has produced a new report in which it claims that the steel industry needs to reduce its emissions by over 70% by 2050 in order to meet the Paris Agreement objectives.

Highlighting information available from the World Steel Association, the CDP report states that the global steel industry is responsible for 7% of emissions, but, according to the report, no progress has been made to reduce emissions in a decade.

According to CDP, “progress on research and development (R&D) in emerging decarbonisation technologies is limited and at early stages. With low industry profitability, R&D expenses have been cut by 14% in US$ terms in recent years and there are no commercially available technologies today which can achieve these targets.”

CDP claims that the threat to the industry is urgent as over 70% of world steel production will be subject to a carbon price by the end of 2017.

The CDP report will no doubt ruffle the feathers of those within the steel industry that are investing heavily in developing emissions reduction technologies, as it claims there has been no industry-wide progress in improving emissions and energy efficiency levels in a decade.

The new report claims that over 40% of the 14 global steel companies analysed have not published any emissions reduction targets beyond 2016.

“The steel industry will have to play a huge part in achieving the 2-degree scenario laid out in the Paris Agreement,” said Drew Fryer, senior analyst, investor research, at CDP. “However, there has been no progress in reducing its emissions over the past decade,” Fryer added, stressing that steelmakers need to prioritise funding of a technology transformation to reduce emissions and ensure targets are met.

Progress, Fryer said, has been ‘far too slow’ to realise the potential of carbon capture and storage (CCS) with no pilot projects underway in the steel industry.

The report has benchmarked leading steel companies on their management of climate issues and found that POSCO from South Korea and Hyundai Steel among the best performing, while Tata Steel and US Steel rank lowest among those who disclosed.