Global Slag News

Canada: Enviri Corporation’s Harsco Environmental division has renewed a steel mill services and products agreement with ArcelorMittal Long Products for its plant in Quebec. Under the two-year deal, Harsco Environmental will continue to offer a range of services, including slag pit digging, metallic recovery, melt shop cleaning, support services and ad-hoc rentals.

Denmark: Finland-based Betolar has supplied its Geoprime additive for its maiden construction project in Denmark. Its customer IBF used the additive to produce low-cement paving stones for a 1.5 hectare expansion to the lorry park at the Port of Aalborg. The stones consisted of an 84mm-thick cement-free base made of Geoprime material, with a 6mm-thick cement-based concrete top. The supplier said that the use of Geoprime reduced the project's cement consumption by 90%. This more than halved the carbon footprint of the work.

Betolar's chief commercial officer Ville Voipio said "This shows that the circular economy solution we have developed, which utilises industrial side streams, also works in large construction projects. We have been doing development work with IBF for a long time. Now there is a product on the Danish market that radically cuts emissions compared to traditional products."

Denmark is committed to eliminating 70% of its annual CO₂ emissions between 2020 and 2030.

Finland: Betolar has signed a cooperation agreement with concrete producer Consolis Parma to develop reduced-CO₂ hollow concrete slabs. The development process will implement Betolar's Geoprime binder into Consolis Parma's concrete production. Consolis Parma is committed to halving its CO₂ emissions between 2021 and 2035.

Consolis Parma's Technology Director Juha Rämö said “The use of alternative new binder combinations and additives that ensure the efficiency of the manufacturing process are key factors in achieving our climate goals. We are actively seeking new channels to address these challenges. The cooperation with Betolar is an important new partnership for us."

Europe/India: Finland-based Betolar has secured EU-wide and Indian patents for a new waste-based alternative concrete produced without cement and capable of storing energy. Betolar said that the material, which is already patented in Finland, is especially suited for use in renewable energy infrastructure, where it can provide a storage solution for dealing with short-term peaks. Chief commercial officer Ville Voipio said that the company will now seek to establish a partnership for commercialisation of its new alternative building material.

Betolar produces and markets the Geoprime additive used to produce cement-free concrete from supplementary cementitious materials, including ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS), in regions that include India and the EU.

US: Harsco Corporation has changed its name to Enviri Corporation. It says that the new name and brand identity reflect its transformation since the late 2010s into a company that provides services to manage, recycle and reuse waste and by-product materials across many industries. Its subsidiaries - Harsco Environmental, Clean Earth and Harsco Rail - will continue to operate under their existing names as divisions of Enviri.

Nick Grasberger, chair and chief executive officer of Enviri Corporation, said “As we considered where we are today, how our business has evolved and our commitment to the environment, it is important to have a name and brand identity that align with this image.”