Eramet Norway

ERAMET NORWAY SUSTAINABILITY REPORT 2014 CONTENTS 04 What’s good for the environment is good for business 06 ERAMET is a world leader in the production of manganese alloys 07 Eramet Norway – a part of ERAMET group’s manganese division 08 ERAMET – part of your daily life 10 ERAMETs operations in Norway 12 A city boy mans the furnace 16 Production of manganese alloys and consumption of raw materials 17 World-class, environmentally-friendly technology 20 A cornerstone of local education and training 22 Eramet Norways energy balance sheet for 2014 23 World´s greenest manganese alloy producer 24 Supporting future research at Eramet Norway 26 Dust exposure systematically reduced 28 Porsgrunn tackling major and minor green issues 30 Norwegian ferroalloy industry aiming high 32 Keeping an eye on the fjords 34 High-tech system can identify water leakage in furnace 12 34 An ethical supply chain 34 Waste as a resource 35 Environmental engineers strengthen our team 38 Improving the safety of our landfills 40 Updating of plant emission licences 43 Plant emission figures 46 HES figures 48 Key financial figures 50 HES policy Eramet Norway supplies refined manganese alloys to steel producers worldwide – backed by Norwegian industrial traditions and sustainable technology INTRODUCTION WHAT’S GOOD FOR THE ENVIRONMENT by Bjørn Kolbjørnsen, CEO, Eramet Norway IS GOOD FOR BUSINESS The market situation for our products remained greater energy efficiency will strengthen our challenging in 2014, with stiff competition and competitive position. The challenges for the low margins. Some of our competitors were project lie in the level of capital expenditure forced to mothball capacity, but Eramet required and the risk of not succeeding despite Norway’s plants remained fully operational, a decade of research. Fortunately for us, the except for a few scheduled maintenance stop- Norwegian authorities are familiar with such pages. Given the market conditions, our finan- challenges and have shown themselves very cial performance was satisfactory – helped by willing to contribute to the project’s success. our cost reduction program, which is intended Productive dialogue is central to our working to ensure that Eramet Norway remains one relationship with both Enova and Innovation of the world’s most efficient manganese alloy Norway. producers in the years ahead. We refine natural resources. Clean Norwegian Green shifts since the 1950s energy and rich manganese ore are the two We have always enjoyed productive dialogue key ingredients that make our process efficient with the regulatory authorities. As a result of in terms of CO2 emissions and energy efficien- continuous improvements over time, we have cy, but here too we see scope for improve- one of the smallest environmental footprints ment. of any manganese alloy producer worldwide. Among the major “green shifts” along the way Developing new, greener technology was the introduction of the world’s first closed In 2014 we launched our master project to manganese furnace in the early 1950s, which develop and implement new, climate-friendly significantly reduced our emissions to air. In technology that offers the potential for higher the 1990s, we developed our own purification productivity, lower CO2 emissions, and more systems for process water, resulting in lower efficient energy use at our Sauda, Porsgrunn emissions to water. In the early 2000s, we were Thanks to continuous and Kvinesdal plants. the first company in our sector to develop and improvements over The project is underpinned by many years of construct systems to filter out heavy metals research and development work, which has in furnace gas. As mentioned above, our next time, our plants have revealed scope for reducing specific energy contribution will be to ensure a more climate- the smallest environ- consumption and CO2 emissions by up to 10 friendly production process. This is a big mental footprint in per cent. In the case of the Sauda plant, the undertaking, and we are grateful to have the project also has the potential to bring a 30 per Norwegian authorities working alongside us. the manganese alloy cent increase in energy utilization. This is a As part of Norway’s processing industry, we industry. large-scale, long-term project that will require refine natural resources into products that play dedicated work for many years to come. an important role in daily life. However, our The concept study that got under way in the corporate social responsibility goes well be- autumn of 2014 is intended to produce a yond this. We need to be aware of the impact project plan for ongoing work in the first half of that our production process and our products 2015. Enova has provided almost NOK 1 million have on the natural world, and to ensure that in financial support for the concept phase. The we continue to do better in future. Eramet obvious benefit of the project is that sound Norway intends to lead the way and to remain business economics and environmental pro- one of the world’s most efficient manganese tection go hand in hand. Operating with even alloy producers. 4 ERAMET NORWAY SUSTAINABILITY REPORT 2014 5 ERAMET GROUP ERAMET IS A WORLD LEADER IN THE PRODUCTION OF MANGANESE ALLOYS The French industrial group ERAMET is the world’s second largest producer of manganese ore and manganese alloys, and the world’s leading producer of refined manganese alloys. The company’s business areas are manganese, nickel and special steel. ERAMET’s most important markets are the steel MANGANESE industry, the aerospace industry, energy, the Manganese is a metallic element belonging transport sector and the tools industry. to Group 7 in the Periodic Table of Elements. Pure manganese is a steel-grey metal. It is hard, but at the same time so brittle that it can be pulverized. On a worldwide basis, there are large deposits of manganese. In the earth’s crust, there are some 900 ppm, making it the second most common metal after iron. It is primarily extrac- 14 000 ted from the mineral pyrolusite (MnO2), also EMPLOYEES IN 20 COUNTRIES known as brownstone. More than 80 per cent THROUGHOUT THE WORLD of occurrences are found in South Africa and Ukraine. Other important deposits are in China, Australia, Brazil, Gabon, India and Mexico. Manganese is also found in the form of nodules on the ocean floor. AREA OF UTILIZATION Manganese is necessary to make steel ductile and durable. For one tonne of steel, about 10 kilograms of manganese alloy is needed. Nearly 90 per cent of the world’s total manga- 6 000 nese alloy production goes into the production of stainless steel: steel for the construction, EMPLOYEES WORLDWIDE IN THE MANGANESE DIVSION energy and transport sectors, and the tool industry, and special steel produced for the 26 BN NOK aeronautics and aerospace industries. REVENUE IN 2014 6 ERAMET NORWAY ERAMET NORWAY ERAMET NORWAY – A PART OF ERAMET GROUP’S WORLD-CLASS MANGANESE DIVISION NORWEGIAN METALLURGICAL EXPERTISE Eramet Norway is part of ERAMET’s Manganese Division, with processing plants at Sauda, Kvinesdal and Porsgrunn, and an Metallurgy is a broad field with a long tradi- R&D group in Trondheim. The company employs 530 people, tion in the ferroalloy industry, in which Norway and its operations make the ERAMET Group the world’s second enjoys high international largest producer of manganese ore and manganese alloys. standing. Metallurgy is metal technology. The employees working in this special- From smelter to modern has been spent on developing and adopting green ized field range from processing plant technology. Today, Eramet Norway can proudly apprentices and process operators to doctoral boast that we operate the world’s cleanest manga- The Norwegian processing plants maintain the level researchers. traditions and expertise that the ferroalloy industry nese alloy production facilities. Modern metal technolo- has built up since industrialization accelerated in gy has become increas- Norway in the early 20th century. Today, Eramet 100 per cent export ingly more sustainable over recent years. Norway supplies manganese alloys to the interna- Eramet Norway exports all its production of man- tional steel industry market. ganese alloys, primarily to Europe and North America. The processing plants transport 98 per The worlds cleanest cent of their production by ship and the remaining manganese alloy production percentage by road and rail. Eramet Norway realized early on that environmentally sustainable onshore industry is the way of Organizational philosophy the future for Norway. Since 2001, when ERAMET The company has a very flat organizational struc- INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS acquired the processing plants previously owned ture built on a strong contribution-based philoso- by Elkem, about half a billion Norwegian kroner phy and the Nordic model of collaboration. One challenge in operating and developing business in Norway is that, in cooperation with Norwegian authorities, we need to adapt our framework conditions so as to create the Eramet Norway’s refining basis for strengthening our international process is an advanced, highly competitiveness. technological process that few other countries in the world are able to emulate. SUSTAINABILITY REPORT 2014 7 PRODUCT Eramet – part of your daily life Iron and steel are essential construction materials in modern society. Just as the body’s bone structure needs calcium for strength, manganese is necessary to make steel ductile and durable. For one tonne of steel, about 10 kilograms of manganese is used. NEARLY 90 PER CENT of the world’s total manganese alloy production is used to make stainless steel and specialty steels for the construction industry, the aeronautics and aerospace industry, the energy and transport sectors, and the machine tool industry. The construction market alone accounts for more than half the steel used worldwide. 8 ERAMET NORWAY EVERYWHERE YOU GO you will encounter products that contain manganese alloys.

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