EUGENE, Ore. — In a potential breakthrough for one of the world’s most carbon-intensive industries, researchers at the University of Oregon have developed a cleaner method for producing iron, an innovation that could transform how steel is made and drastically reduce global emissions.
The traditional process of producing iron, the key ingredient in steel, relies on coal-powered blast furnaces. This accounts for around 11% of global carbon emissions. But the UO team is taking a different approach, one powered by electricity and saltwater instead of fossil fuels.
“There’s a lot of things today that we need to make with cleaner resources,” said UO chemistry professor Paul Kempler. “It’s fundamentally interesting to us to find reactions that we can drive using clean electric power.”…