Google has joined the Sustainable Steel Buyers Platform (SSBP), a partnership of various corporations organised by the US-based energy and sustainability non-profit organization RMI. SSBP includes major tech firms Meta, Microsoft, and Amazon as members. Including Google, the platform now has eight major backers.
The intention of this Alliance, under SSBP, is to bring together ambitious corporations in sectors with high steel usage, such as technology, construction, and manufacturing, and facilitate low-emission steel procurement in North America. They launched with support from several partners with expertise in the sector, such as the First Mover Coalition, Climate Group, and Responsible Steel.
In Q3, 2023, the platform issued a request for information (RFI) to gather feedback from steel manufacturers. The aim was to understand their perspectives on timelines, technology options, and emissions benchmarks for near-zero-emission steel production. Additionally, the RFI sought input on how to structure a potential green premium across various steel products. Following this, a request for proposals (RFP) was launched to enable buyers to directly procure new near-zero steel supply, align demand with specific product requirements, and tackle critical challenges in measuring, verifying, and reporting emissions.
The RFP invited all iron and steel producers and their suppliers to submit proposals for supplying 1-2 million tons of near-zero emissions steel to North America by 2030. To qualify, bids had to meet strict emissions limits and provide verified lifecycle emissions data to back their claims, as per the reports suggest. The RFP is now closed. Following this, the buyers are now able to negotiate individual offtake agreements based on the jointly determined green premium and other terms, such as steel specifications and pricing.
As Steel is a vital material in the construction of data centers, and due to its traditional role in the foundations and shell of the building, it is also used in the racking, service enclosures, cooling systems, piping, and power generation equipment. AWS has already committed to the use of green steel following a partnership with SSAB in November of last year. The deal is to ensure that AWS pilots the use of green steel in one of its three new data centers in Sweden. The green steel is expected to be used in the construction of the roof and wall structures at the AWS Västerås data center. SSAB subsidiary Ruukki Construction will supply the steel for the data center.