Sheffield firm powers up with recycling scheme

Sheffield Forgemasters set itself an ambitious site-wide approach to recycle 100 per cent of process waste rather than sending anything to landfill.

The firm is regularly managing to recycle more than 99.5 per cent of waste and on occasional months, has met the 100 per cent target.

Andrew Segrott, Sheffield Forgemasters environment manager, said: “To avoid the use of metal ores and raw materials extracted from the earth in our steel production, we adopt a ‘Green Steel’ approach.

“This means sourcing scrap steel left over from other, third-party manufacturing companies and processes and maximising on everything that can be recycled through our steel making process, combined with a site-wide approach to recycle 100 per cent of our process waste, rather than sending anything to landfill.

“We have set an ambitious target, but are regularly managing to recycle more than 99.5 per cent of waste and on occasional months, have met our 100 per cent target.”

The company's 64-acre Brightside Lane site, in Brightside, is also supplied with renewable heat from the Sheffield district heating network, saving about 10,000 MWh of gas per year.

DHN energy is generated in a biomass-fuelled combined heat and power plant, from waste food and wood.

Mr Segrott said: “Although Sheffield Forgemasters is reliant on high energy use to power its plant, the company is firmly committed to improving green efficiencies across its operations.

“In recent years, we have made significant energy saving investments in our site and equipment from simple measures such as LED lighting to an investment of £2 million in our electric arc furnace to make it more energy efficient. Our gas burners for furnaces have all been replaced with highly efficient burners and we continually adopt improvements to insulation and refractory materials so we contain as much heat as possible.

“We have installed water meters throughout the site allowing us to track and reduce usage. This has led to a reduction in the millions of litres.”