Coking coal

What it is

Coking (metallurgical) coal is a high-carbon coal baked into coke, the reductant used to turn iron ore into pig iron in blast furnaces.

Why it matters

It is not burned for energy but consumed chemically. Decarbonising steel means replacing it with hydrogen-based direct reduction (DRI).

Circular challenges

Whether coking coal re-enters the economy at end-of-life is mostly settled at the design stage. These are the recurring blockers.

• Consumed in use

  Coking coal is reacted away in the furnace — there is no coke to recycle, only the steel it produces.

• Scrap-based steel scales differently

  Electric arc furnaces fed by scrap avoid coking coal entirely, but rely on clean, well-sorted scrap streams.

• Hydrogen DRI is the exit

  Green hydrogen direct reduction removes the need for coking coal, but requires cheap renewable power and new plant.