Key environmental indicators
NLMK is committed to consistent efforts to minimize its environmental impact and achieving best-in-class environmental performance.
Since 2000, NLMK invested approximately RUB 51 bn in its environmental projects. Since then, the output has almost doubled and the company became the largest steel producer in Russia. Adoption of new state-of-the-art technologies alongside a major equipment upgrade significantly reduced the Group’s environmental footprint.
Investment in NLMK Group environmental projects, $ m
Advanced technologies for recycling secondary resources and other recycling initiatives enable efficient secondary resource use. In 2020, 99% of iron-containing raw materials at NLMK Group companies was recycled*.
In 2020 NLMK Lipetsk fully recycled its slag dump, where 5 million tonnes of secondary resources had amassed since the 1970s. Over 300,000 tonnes of iron was extracted from the dump and recycled in steel production. Approximately 25 hectares of usable space was returned into operation.
excluding mining waste
Evolution of secondary resource recycling, %
The advanced environmental technologies that NLMK Group employs have made it one of the industry leaders when it comes to efficient water consumption and minimal negative impact on the water bodies of its home regions.
Specific consumptive water use (the spread between total water withdrawal and discharge) is continuously decreasing. In 2020 the reduction reached 5.1 m3/t.
The majority of NLMK Group companies are equipped with water recycling systems. Water recycling solutions have been put in place at NLMK Lipetsk, Altai-Koks, VIZ-Steel, NLMK Kaluga, Stoilensky Mining and Beneficiation Plant, NLMK Ural, NLMK Metalware, NLMK DanSteel, NLMK Indiana, NLMK Pennsylvania, NLMK Sharon Coating, NLMK Verona, NLMK Clabecq, NLMK La Louvière. These solutions include both local systems for individual facilities and self-contained systems. The systems serve to reduce water withdrawal and effluent discharge into surface water bodies.
The share of recycled water supply at NLMK Group remains at a consistently high level of 97%. In 2020, NLMK Group reached a five-year low of natural water consumption due to operational measures for consumption control.
In 2020 NLMK Lipetsk implemented a project to upgrade local wastewater treatment facilities, with investment amounting to RUB 118 million. Over the last five years, the volume of water disposal at the Lipetsk site went down by 4.2 million m3 (-34%).
Over the last 40 years, the annual withdrawal of fresh water from the Voronezh River by the Group’s core site in Lipetsk has decreased by a factor of nine.
Reduction of specific consumptive water use at NLMK Group sites, m3/t of steel
Today, NLMK Group has halved its specific atmospheric emissions, achieving the level of best available technologies.
These results were made possible by a set of management activities and investment projects. The measures include production line overhauls, installing high-efficiency dust and gas cleaning units, mounting or modifying filtering equipment, as well as introducing technologies for secondary resource neutralization, capture, and utilization in the production loop.
Reduction of specific emissions at NLMK Group sites, kg/t of steel
*Specific emissions without the impact of temporary factors related to lower production
*Specific emissions without the impact of temporary factors related to lower production