British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Surprised no one has mentioned this yet.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cyvqm83z1nrt

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

One of very few Saturday sittings, though for some reason they’re still trying not to nationalise the plant. The present legislation allows them to step in and override the owner *if* the owner orders the place shut down. Nationalising it against the owner’s will is another future step requiring another bill.

I can’t see any other way forward for the mill though. It’s the last place left in the UK where we can produce virgin steel. It is a strategic asset which we can’t afford to lose (and which a cynical part of me wonders whether China was trying to do away with).

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

I agree we can't let the plant fail but it's not helped by Milibands madness ,we are importing coal from Japan when the UK has more coal than you can shake a stick at, how can it ever be competitive.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

The Chinese owners have apparently been starving the plant of coke, and without that, production would have stopped.

Net zero down the plughole to placate the unions?

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

I guess if you’re a steelworks in England you get bailed out by the government.

But if you’re in Port Talbot you get naff-all.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Apart from the £500+m. Not enough demand to need two sets of blast furnaces producing virgin steel.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Devolution’s a bitch.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

I’m sure that will warm the cockles of the 2000 people made redundant.

---------- Post added at 20:42 ---------- Previous post was at 20:42 ----------

It may well be but it isn’t the same as self-governance.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

And then you die ;)

They can't make steel any more but on the upside they can drive at 20mph

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

If they’d decided to convert Scunthorpe first and Port Talbot was the last blast furnace capable of producing virgin steel, that would be the one getting legislated for today, because the strategic imperative would be the same. Perversely it seems the Chinese thought they could do something with Port Talbot whereas they have been quietly planning to shutter Scunthorpe completely. Either that or it was just the luck of the draw. Cold comfort to Port Talbot either way though.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Coke is an ingredient for the steel, how does that affect net zero ?

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coke_(fuel)

Coke is a grey, hard, and porous coal-based fuel with a high carbon content. It is made by heating coal or petroleum in the absence of air. Coke is an important industrial product, used mainly in iron ore smelting, but also as a fuel in stoves and forges.

The unqualified term "coke" usually refers to the product derived from low-ash and low-sulphur bituminous coal by a process called coking. A similar product called petroleum coke, or pet coke, is obtained from crude petroleum in petroleum refineries. Coke may also be formed naturally by geologic processes.[1] It is the residue of a destructive distillation process.

Since smoke-producing constituents are driven off during the coking of coal, coke forms a desirable fuel for stoves and furnaces in which conditions are not suitable for the complete burning of bituminous coal itself. Coke may be combusted producing little or no smoke, while bituminous coal would produce much smoke. Coke was widely used as a smokeless fuel substitute for coal in domestic heating following the creation of "smokeless zones" in the United Kingdom.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Coke is modified coal. Net zero says we should not use coal in any form.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Apparently the government have just discovered this hidden gem

https://www.google.com/search?q=immi...hrome&ie=UTF-8

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

As a fuel to make the steel, maybe.
However, you also need carbon to create the steel itself.
That carbon also (normally) comes from the coke.
As best I can tell, its not impossible to use other sources of carbon, but none are as common.

Of course, "Net Zero" is a far off (and currently unrealisitc) fantasy anyway.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

In virgin steel production at Scunthorpe the coke provides some of the heat as well as the source of carbon. They also seem to use some unmodified coal in the process.

Virgin steel production without coke is possible, apparently they do it in Iran and India, and there are newer methods which aren’t commercialised yet, but any of these would require the steelworks to be rebuilt.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

So we now have emergency ship-loads of coking coal and iron ore heading to the UK from the USA and Australia, with some apparently likely to come from Japan as well, and no doubt we paid top-tier prices for it to make sure it doesn’t get diverted anywhere else en route.

I wonder whether Friends of the Earth still think they scored a win by preventing it being mined in Cumbria and delivered to Scunthorpe by train, a mere 300 miles away?

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

This is the fallacy of net-zero.

Like, saying Drax is renewable by switching the fuel from coal to "bio-mass" wood pellets, shipped across the Atlantic from Canada (using renewable diesel no doubt) and then by train from Liverpool (again using that renewable diesel)

Virtue signalling at a billion dollar scale.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Thread revival time :D

BBC news: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr5rgdpvn63o

The UK has secured a £10bn deal to supply the Norwegian navy with at least five new warships.

The government said the deal would support 4,000 UK jobs "well into the 2030s", including more than 2,000 at BAE Systems' Glasgow shipyards where the frigates will be built.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the agreement would "drive growth and protect national security for working people".

Not one mention in that story of where the steel is coming from :rofl:

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Most of it comes from overseas because governments past and present already shamefully allowed our strategic ability to produce it domestically to wither.

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Yup…

From 2017

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/type...foreign-steel/

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

Good news / bad news

Re: British Steel bill to save Scunthorpe
 

That'll be everything but the ammo magazines then :D