Swerim and Hybrit start a new lab

I the Hybrit-labs in Kista north of Stockholm, a research team will focus on reduction-studies with hydrogen. Hydrogen is a main part of the process towards av fossil-free steel-making.

- All equipment will soon be in place and we are ready to start the experiments in a few weeks, says Johan Martinsson, who leads four doctoral students. The team comes from the KTH, the technical university in Stockholm where they already have worked with research for the Hybrit-project.

The team will study different parts of the optimization of the process of fossil-free steel-making.

Swerim is Swedens leading industrial research institute within engineering, process metallurgy, material, manufacturing engineering and applications. It has laboratory facilities and 190 professionals located in Luleå and Stockholm. It offers testbeds and demonstrators för development and verification of production processes and optimization of material properties.

In 2016, the steelproducer SSAB, the stateowned mining company LKAB and the stateowned energyproducer Vattenfall joined forces to create Hybrit. Hybrit aims to replace coking coal, traditionally needed for ore-based steel making, with hydrogen. The result will be the world’s first fossil-free steel-making technology, with virtually no carbon footprint.

In Luleå in the north of Sweden, a pilot plant for fossil-free steel production started in 2020. The goal is to have a solution for fossil-free steel by 2035. If successful, Hybrit can reduce Sweden’s carbon dioxid emissions by 10 percent and Finland’s by 7 percent.