|
|
Subscribe to E-News
Sign up to receive timely email updates about corrugated steel pipe news and products.
Shop Our Store
| Electronic CSP Manual Published.  |
 |
| View entire store | |
Member Log-in
NCSPA Member Area.
If you are an NCSPA member that is not currently registered, click below for a new account.
Search
Bookmark Us
 |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  |
 |  |  |
| Recycled Content |
|
Steel is the world's--as well as North America's--most recycled material. In the United States alone, almost 69 million tons of steel were recycled or exported for recycling in 2003. Modern steel production relies on two technologies, both of which utilize old steel to make new steel: the basic oxygen furnace (BOF) and the electric arc furnace (EAF). The basic oxygen furnace (BOF) process uses 29 percent old steel to make new. It produces products--such as automotive fenders, encasements of refrigerators, and packaging like soup cans, five-gallon pails, and 55-gallon drums--whose major required characteristic is drawability. The electric arc furnace (EAF) process uses 80-100 percent old steel to make new. It is primarily used to manufacture products--such as corrugated steel pipe, steel plates, structural beams and reinforcement bars--whose major required characteristic is strength. Steel recycling has both an economic and environmental benefit. It is less expensive to recycle steel than to mine virgin ore and move it through the process of making new steel. And today, two out of every three pounds of new steel are produced from old steel. However, because steel is such a durable material (pipe, bridges, cars and other steel products last a long time), it is necessary to continue to mine virgin ore to supplement the production of new steel. Economic expansion, domestically and internationally, creates additional demand that cannot be fully met by available scrap supplies. And unlike other competing industries, recycling is second nature for the steel industry. The North American steel industry has been recycling steel scrap for over 150 years through the more than 1,800 scrap processors and some 12,000 auto dismantlers. Information provided by the Steel Recycling Institute, the American Iron and Steel Institute and the American Institute of Steel Construction, Inc. |
