Tata Steel, as a leading member of the South Wales Industrial Cluster (SWIC), is helping shape regional efforts to decrease carbon emissions, aimed at creating the world’s first net-zero industrial cluster.
The first phase of SWIC’s Roadmap and Deployment project has received a significant boost thanks to grant funding of £295,000 from UK Research and Innovation – a partnership of universities, research organisations, businesses, charities, and government - with more funding available for future stages. If successful the plan would see Tata Steel’s integrated steelworks at Port Talbot playing a major role as one of four possible anchor sites.
The announcement is one of a number of initiatives to help Tata Steel’s European business achieve its ambition of becoming carbon neutral by 2050.
Phase one of the project will create a plan for a series of local zero-carbon areas to lower emissions, create skilled jobs and enhance well-being across South Wales. If SWIC projects proceed successfully, they will improve the UK’s ability to locally manufacture steel products with low carbon emissions, helping to drive the low-carbon future of UK construction and other sectors such as defence, car manufacturing, packaging and even coin production.
SWIC initiatives will also make a vital contribution to the economic resilience of the Welsh economy by bringing in new high-skilled jobs and ensuring operations are sustainable in the long term.
Key areas for SWIC in the first phase of the project include examining the infrastructure required for the development of the hydrogen economy, for large scale CO2 capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) and transport.
Chris Williams, of Tata Steel and Flexis, interim lead of the SWIC, said: “SWIC presents a key opportunity to support Wales’ net zero ambitions by uniting the various decarbonisation programmes in South Wales into a single roadmap for the first time. By helping to develop an industrial strategy, which allows companies in Wales to grow while also reducing CO2 emissions, the plan will create new jobs and provide a sustainable industrial base for future generations.”
Other partners in SWIC include Costain, CR Plus, RWE, Progressive Energy, University of South Wales, Celsa Manufacturing, Tarmac, Valero Energy, Progressive Energy, Capital Law, Flexible Process Consultants the Port of Milford Haven and Vale Europe.
For more information on the partnership, see here.
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For further information: Damien Brook on +44 (0) 7951989490 or damien.brook@tatasteeleurope.com
About Tata Steel’s European operations
Tata Steel is one of Europe's leading steel producers, with steelmaking in the Netherlands and the UK, and manufacturing plants across Europe. The company supplies high-quality steel products to the most demanding markets, including construction and infrastructure, automotive, packaging and engineering. Tata Steel works with customers to develop new steel products which give them a competitive edge. The Tata Steel group is among the top global steel companies with an annual crude steel capacity of 33 million tonnes. It is one of the world's most geographically-diversified steel producers, with operations and a commercial presence across the world. The group’s turnover (excluding its South East Asia operations) in the year ending March 2019 was US $22.67 billion.
