An aerial view of the Roberto Rocca Technical School, the Ternium educational program that won the worldsteel's Steelie Award in 2019.
Ternium is one of the Sustainability Champions of the World Steel Association (worldsteel) and its data about economic, environmental, and social sustainability are part of a new report of this company.
About one billion cars are currently in use on the planet. 70% of the world's population will be living in cities by 2050. Containers and packaging represent a third of the world's waste. Why is this data important? Because the steel industry has implemented actions to respond to these global sustainability challenges: steel is an infinitely recyclable material, which is adapting to the needs and challenges of sustainable mobility, provides steel to make buildings more energy efficient and carbon neutral, and provides steel products that allow the packaging industry to be more sustainable and economical. These are only three example of steel applications, a material that is present in almost every aspect of modern life.
Recently, worldsteel published a report about the sustainability in the industry. Sustainable Steel - Indicators 2020 and Steel Applications presents the industry's sustainability performance through its eight sustainability indicators and focuses on three key steel applications from a product life cycle perspective: automotive, construction and packaging.
These are the worldsteel indicators to measure the key aspects of the steel industry's economic, environmental and social sustainability performance:
- CO2 (carbon dioxide) Emissions
- Energy Intensity
- Material Efficency
- Environmental Management Systems (EMS)
- Lost-time Injury Frequency Rate
- Employee Training
- Investment in New Processes and Products
- Economic Value Distributed
Ternium, alongside other eight steel companies, was awarded by worldsteel as Champion of the Steel Sustainability for their work in 2019. This award means that the company must provide data for each of the indicators and for the database of the worldsteel's life cycle inventory database. In addition, the organization preselects a program or initiative from the companies for one of the five categories of the Steelie Awards, or any security and health recognition program. In 2019, for example, Ternium won the prize in the category of Educational Excellence for the Roberto Rocca Technical School in Pesqueria, Mexico.
Worldsteel stated that: "The life cycle assessment (LCA) of a product provides a full picture of its environmental performance as it accounts for resource and energy consumption, as well as all emissions to air, water and land". LCA also considers all stages of a product's life, from the raw material extraction stage to its end-of-life stage, including reuse and recycling.
"Construction, automotive and packaging are examples of three key steel market sectors where life cycle thinking is being incorporated into regulations or standards", the Association explained. "A more widespread use of LCA in other applications is crucial to minimize the overall environmental impact of products throughout their whole life".
A total of 104 steel companies represent 1.1 billion tonnes of crude steel production contributed data, therefore the worldsteel's data covers nearly 60% of global crude steel production.