Emirates Steel: The largest integrated producers of steel in the UAE

Emirates Steel was established to facilitate infrastructure developments and industrial growth where steel plays an essential role. Eventually, this would support the growth of the country's non-oil GDP in line with the Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030. In 1998, Senaat, the UAE's largest industrial conglomerate, acquired the Musaffah-based Emirates Iron and Steel Factory and inaugurated its plan to develop a significant and durable upstream steel business to complement downstream private sector investments. The initial success of the project led the company to undertake a large-scale modernisation and phased expansion programme, which resulted in a huge boost of capacity and production. "Emirates Steel has firstly committed to a capital investment of approximately Dh11 billion in its Phase 1 and Phase 2 expansion programmes. In August 2010, the Company finalised its long-term funding and secured US$2 billion to finance its expansion plans and working capital needs from local, regional and international banks, reflecting a real vote of confidence in its business," says Saeed Ghumran Al Remithi.
Phase 1 transformed the Company from a simple steel re-roller to the first fully integrated steel manufacturer in the UAE, "It significantly increased the Company's rolling capacity to around 2.5 MTPA. The construction and installation of the Phase 1 Expansion programme was completed in June 2009. Afterwards, Phase 2 Expansion Project was completed, this involved the construction of Heavy and Jumbo Sections Rolling Mill, and resulted in increasing the output capacity to nearly 3.5 MTPA, positioning Emirates Steel as the only producer of jumbo and heavy sections in the Middle East," he adds.
Since the beginning, Emirates steel adopted a vision for economic heavy industry development. "Simultaneously, our focus was the environment, whereby we instigated eco-friendly initiatives to minimise the effects of our operations. Additionally, an emphasis was centered on human resources investment to match the technological upgrade of the plants, and this was done through continuous training programmes for our workforce. Currently, Emirates Steel is implementing an ambitious strategic business development plan to increase its production capacity and diversify its product range, driven by the main objective to serve the local and regional requirements for high quality steel products," states the dynamic CEO.
The UAE is leading the way in the region in developing a blueprint for how to incubate and establish a low-carbon, new-energy industry. "The government is adopting an approach to utilise clean technologies, renewable energy and low-carbon solutions that have economic and environmental returns. "In alignment with this vision, Emirates Steel strives to fulfil its objectives by producing steel in a safe and sustainable way," he says. 
Emirates Steel is an integral part of Masdar and ADNOC's first CO2 capture, usage and storage initiative in the region (CCUS), which is the first in the Middle East. "Accordingly, it is part of the government's continued efforts to create a low-carbon steel industry and enhance CO2 management in UAE. The CCUS project consists of three steps - beginning with captured the CO2 from the Emirates Steel plants, and secondly, compressing the CO2 and transporting it along the 50 km pipeline by Masdar to oil fields operated by ADNOC. Finally, the third and last step is when ADNOC will inject the CO2 into their oil fields to enhance oil recovery, while storing the injected CO2 underground. This pioneering initiative will not only allow industrial capture of CO2 from Emirates Steel's facilities, but it will also allow for it to be utilised enhancing oil recovery. This project will also liberate natural methane gas, traditionally used to pressurise oil wells and oil recovery, to use it for other traditional power generation and water desalination," adds the CEO. 
"Furthermore, Emirates Steel has a goal of implementing a strategic business development plan to further increase its production capacity and diversify its product range. Our main objective is to be the first integrated steel manufacturer in the region, in line with the country's economic vision 2030," concludes Al Remithi.

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