The partners behind a project aiming to develop the world’s first fossil-free hydrogen-powered steel plant will participate in the Climate Week and UN Climate Action Summit in New York next week.

The Hybrit (Hydrogen breakthrough ironmaking technology) initiative, owned by Swedish power company Vattenfall, Swedish-Finnish firm SSAB and Swedish mining corporation LKAB, will replace coal with fossil-free electricity and hydrogen to eliminate CO2 emissions and help the world mitigate climate change.

In today’s ore-based steelmaking process, iron ore pellets are converted into metallic iron by reduction in a blast furnace. The iron oxide and carbon then react to form CO2 gases, as well as metallic iron. The iron is further processed before a semi-finished steel product is produced.

The Hybrit process is based on direct reduction of iron ore using fossil-free electricity and hydrogen. Hydrogen is produced by electrolysis of water using fossil-free electricity. The hydrogen reacts with the oxygen in the iron ore and metallic iron and H2O (water vapor) is formed.