Time-dependent material flow analysis of iron and steel in the UK: Part 1: Production and consumption trends 1970–2000

Abstract

This paper presents a detailed account of the supply chain for iron and steel in the UK, using material flow analysis. Due to the lack of a universally agreed methodology of material flow analysis, we include an explanation of the accounting methodology employed in the study. Data for the supply chain has been collected reaching back three decades, enabling analysis of trends in production and consumption of iron and steel over the years. This first part of a series of two papers quantifies the iron and steel flows through the UK economy including the annual amount of iron and steel embodied in all final goods that enter the use phase in the UK. The second part explores the more elusive flows of scrap generation and recycling. In this first paper we show that the UK no longer has the capacity to recycle the scrap it collects and is increasingly relying on foreign economies to do so. We also observe that trade in iron and steel products and ferrous metal containing final goods has increased dramatically over the years, but remained relatively balanced. Today, one-half of UK's iron and steel production is exported, whereas one-half of the iron and steel entering the UK use phase comes from imported final goods. The efficiency with which the UK iron and steel industry transforms iron ore and scrap into iron and steel products has increased substantially. However, there is no significant downward trend in the absolute level of iron and steel use in the UK. Between 1970 and 1981 the annual amount of steel put to use dropped from 16.4 to 10.7 million metric tonnes but climbed back up to 15 million metric tonnes twice since then.