Posted on 25 May 2023
The Xuan Thien green steel project in Vietnam is targeting 9.5 million tonnes/year of low-carbon-emission finished steel capacity, Dinh Quoc Thai, secretary general of the Vietnam Steel Association, said at the South East Asia Iron and Steel Institute conference in Manila on Tuesday.
Sources involved in discussions with the project however tell Kallanish it is on a slow burn due to the weak market in Vietnam.
The project is currently only building a pre-fabricated concrete structures facility which it aims to commission in 2024. In future, however, it intends to build a 7.5m t/y plant at Xuan Thien Nam Dinh, and a 2m t/y plant at Xuan Thien Nghia Hung. It hopes to build an EAF meltshop and downstream facilities, and use a combination of DRI and scrap as feedstock. The plant would ultimately switch to green hydrogen to reduce iron, and wind power to supply its EAF.
Sources at more than one company in discussion with the project note that the conversations they are having are serious but that the equipment planned for the new steelworks is yet to be chosen.
One source notes the company does not want to progress investment too fast as the Vietnamese steel market is weak and credit is very difficult to secure. He adds that the company may have to scale back some of its ambitions, at least in the first phase.
Source:Kallanish
