Whitepaper highlighting the critical role of scrap markets in powering India’s green steel transition released
New Delhi: The whitepaper, ‘Closing the Loop: Scrap Markets to Power India’s Green Steel Transition’, was recently released by the India Green Steel Coalition (IGSC), highlighting the growing importance of ferrous scrap in enabling India’s transition to low-carbon steel. IGSC is a joint initiative of WWF-India and the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and aims to promote green steel manufacturing and consumption in India through enabling policies and demand alignment.
As India’s steel production expands and increasingly shifts toward secondary steelmaking routes, the demand for scrap is set to rise sharply. The whitepaper underscores a growing appetite for scrap, particularly from Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) and Induction Furnace (IF) based producers, where scrap serves as a critical input for reducing carbon emissions by replacing primary raw materials and improving resource efficiency.
India currently consumes around 41 million tonnes of ferrous scrap annually, accounting for approximately 23% of crude steel production. Aligned with the Government of India’s target to increase the share of scrap in steelmaking to 50% by 2047, total demand is projected to exceed 200 million tonnes in the long term. However, constraints in domestic scrap generation and collection systems are likely to limit supply growth.
Domestic availability of scrap is therefore unlikely to keep pace with this rising demand, with an estimated shortfall of 40–50 million tonnes. This emerging structural supply gap is expected to increase reliance on imports and exposure to global price and supply risks, elevating scrap from a traded commodity to a strategic resource for India’s steel sector.
The whitepaper calls for strengthening the domestic scrap ecosystem through improved collection systems, formalisation of the value chain, and development of processing infrastructure. In addition, enabling policy support will be critical to ensure an efficient, transparent, and reliable supply of quality scrap at scale.
Mr Vishal Dev, Director, Sustainable Business, WWF-India, said, “Ferrous scrap must be recognised as a strategic resource for India’s steel sector, given its critical role in enabling near-term emissions reduction and improving resource efficiency. At the same time, achieving long-term and deeper decarbonisation will require a dual transition pathway. While scrap-based steelmaking can act as an immediate lever, continued focus on scaling green hydrogen-based technologies and other low carbon solutions will be essential to meet India’s net zero ambitions and build a truly future-ready steel sector.”
This whitepaper is part of IGSC’s ongoing efforts to support India’s transition to a low-carbon and resource-efficient steel sector by convening industry stakeholders, strengthening evidence-based policy dialogue, and promoting scalable solutions.
