- As part of her summer tour, Katherina Reiche visits the SALCOS® construction site, where low-CO2 steel will be produced from the middle of next year .
Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Katherina Reiche learned about the transformation progress of Salzgitter AG during her summer tour, which took her to selected German companies. On Thursday, she visited the Lower Saxony-based steel producer and toured the SALCOS® construction site. The Federal Minister and other guests, including Lower Saxony State Secretary Matthias Wunderling-Weilbier and Member of Parliament Dunja Kreiser (constituency Wolfenbüttel-Salzgitter-Nordharz), were accompanied on the tour of the steelworks by Gunnar Groebler, CEO of Salzgitter AG, and Heike Denecke-Arnold, Managing Director of Salzgitter Flachstahl GmbH. Together with Hasan Cakir, Chairman of the Group Works Council of Salzgitter AG, they presented the progress made toward green steel to the political guests and emphasized the importance of reliable regulatory frameworks for the successful continuation of this process.
Following the tour of the plant premises and the visit to the SALCOS® construction site, Katherina Reiche expressed her admiration and emphasized the significance of Salzgitter AG’s pioneering role in the steel industry. She praised Salzgitter AG’s entrepreneurial approach and simultaneously highlighted the excellent cooperation between politics and business in this transformation project, as well as the steel industry’s contribution to the resilience of the economy and society.
Salzgitter’s CEO, Gunnar Groebler, described the visit of the Federal Minister for Economic Affairs as “something special and an honor,” and took the opportunity to thank her, also for the funding provided by the federal and state governments for SALCOS®. “We must not forget that our transformation project is being implemented with significant support from the federal government and the state of Lower Saxony,” said Groebler. He urged the federal government to continue its efforts to ensure functioning regulatory frameworks for the steel industry in Europe and competitive energy prices for energy-intensive industries in Germany.
The SALCOS® – Salzgitter Low CO2 Steelmaking program is funded by the federal and state governments with a total of €1.3 billion and aims to make steel production in Salzgitter largely CO2 – neutral in the long term using green hydrogen. The first phase of the SALCOS® expansion will be completed next year, and the first green steel from Salzgitter will be delivered to customers.