South Korea to Generate 16.75 Million tonnes Steel Scrap in 2020, Analyst

Ibaraki based research company, Steel Recycling Research released outlook on ferrous scrap supply in China and South Korea in 2020 based on the accumulated steel. The firm expects South Korean obsolete scrap supply is 16.75 million tonnes in 2020, which is around 5 million tonnes higher than 11.9 million tonnes in 2010.

The firm expects South Korean accumulated steel is 761.45 million tonnes in 2020 when the volume increases by annual 22 million tonnes or current pace. The higher domestic scrap supply reduces the scrap import to around 3 million tonnes from current 8 million tonnes. The firm expects actual import would be around 4 million tonnes in 2020 when electric furnace steel production increases by around 1 million tonnes after expansion by POSCO Specialty Steel and YK Steel.

The firm expects South Korea would need import of high grade scrap while the country would export low grade scrap. The trade balance depends on quality improvement through better processing capacity.

China Association of Metal Scrap Utilization (CAMU) expects accumulated steel increases from 5.152 billion tonnes in 2011 to 10 billion tonnes in 2020. CAMU expects scrap supply increases from 100 million tonnes to 200 million tonnes during the period. Steel Recycling Research expects China needs better base for scrap distribution and processing for CAMU’s outlook.

The firm sees annual 550 million tonnes of the accumulated steel increase in China would be overestimate. The firm sees Chinese accumulated steel would world top class of 8.7 billion tonnes in 2020 if the increase pace would be annual 400 million tonnes of moderate volume.